honour him he will honour, fo thofe that defpife him fhall be lightly esteem'd by him that made them, and by good Angels, and by good Men. Their Shame of their own Doings, if it has been laid afleep, will be awakened by that Difgrace into which they will fall, before all the World, when God fhall fay to them, Depart from me, ye Workers of Iniquity, I know you not; and when their Unrighteousness and Ingratitude, their Lying and Hypocrify, their Folly and Prefumption, and their brutifh Delights and Pleafures, fhall be all laid open to publick View, then will they difcern the wide Difference between what they have been, and what they ought to have been; and then with what Confufion will their Faces be covered, what Burdens will they be to themfelves, how will they be filled with Dishonour, Reproach, and Shame? And are not they injurious to their own Natures, whom God hath created with Capacities of Glory and Honour, but they throw themselves into the Bottom of Difgrace and Infamy? But,

3dly, Befides thefe Natural Rewards of Virtue and Piety, which Human Nature may obtain, that is, a chearful Confcience and true Praife, there are other Rewards too, depending upon the Bounty of God, as he is a moft good Being, upon the Wisdom of God, as he is the Ruler and Judge of Mankind,

and I may add, upon the Fidelity of his Promife. And as by doing that which is right in his Sight we are qualified for these, fo by neglecting this, or doing the contrary, we are obnoxious to fuch Punishments as an Almighty Being, and his angry Juftice, can inflict upon us. On the one fide, it feemed not enough to Divine Providence to let Virtue be its own Reward, God had Rewards of his own befides to bestow upon good Men voluntarily and freely, in Teftimony of his Love to Righteoufnefs, of his Goodness to his Creatures, of his wife and juft Providence, and of the Excellency of his Government, and these are such as he has been pleased to promise in the Revelation of his Will to Man by his own Son; as, the Refurrection of the Juft to an immortal Life, the Incorruptibility of their rais'd Bodies, the Security and delightful Employments of his Kingdom, and the Enjoyment of himself for ever. On the other hand, it was not enough to leave the Wicked under that Vexation and Shame, which naturally follows their brutish and unrighteous A&tions, when they can delude and flatter themselves no longer, there is fomething more due to the offended Juftice of God, fome Honour must be done to that Divine Law and Authority, which they have contemned and made light of; and therefore it became the Wisdom and Juftice of God

to

to add other Punishments to the natural Confequences of their Vices, as, that they fhould rise again to Everlafting Condemnation, as the Righteous do to Life Eternal. Now is it not a plain Effect of the Wisdom and Goodness of God, that when he created all Things, he was pleased to make one fort of Creatures, that in the trueft Senfe fhould be capable of his Rewards, that is, to whom he might express his Juftice and Truth, to whom he might be kind and liberal, who fhould feel his great Bounty and Goodness upon their well-doing, who might rife to Eternal Happiness by his Power and Providence? And is it not well for us that we are of this Rank and Order of Creatures, who are capable of being infinitely more perfect and happy than we are at prefent, who may grow up to vaftly better Enjoyments than we are now in Poffeffion of? And therefore if nothing but our fincere Obedience to his Will can put us into a full Capacity of thefe Rewards, are we not ftrangely forgetful of our felves, and very regardless what Kind of Creatures we are, and to what Ends we were made, do we not prove inexcufably wanting to our felves, and cross the very Defign of our Beings, and in the higheft Degree wrong our own Souls, if we take no Care to purify our felves, and to live anfwerably to this Hope, especially fince the fame Nature, which Bb 2

makes

makes us capable of Reward in cafe we perform our Duty, renders us also liable to Punishment in cafe we do it not, especially if we look fo far into our felves, as to confider, that we have immortal as well as reafonable Souls, the Injury therefore that we do our felves appearing to be greater, as much greater as the Moment of this Life is fhorter than Eternity? If that Joy and Delight, that Honour and Praife, that Bleffing and Reward, which our Souls make us capable of, will be endless, because they are as well Ever-during as Rational Beings, then is God fo much the more good to us, in framing us for Everlafting Happiness, and the ungodly Man fo much the more bad and injurious to himself in depriving himself of it; fuch Extremity of Folly and Madness being implied in Ungodlinefs and Unrighteoufnefs, that what is truly and really the Effect of God's immense Bounty and Goodness to us, in enduing us with Reafon and Immortality, is thereby perverted into the greateft Plague and Mifery.

And thus it appears from the proper Excellencies and peculiar Advantages of Human Nature above that of inferior Beings, that the ungodly Man doth altogether fruftrate and difappoint them, as to the Good which they capacitate him for, whilft he improves them only to make himself as wretched as he can be; and therefore that

no

no one Man can be injurious to another as he is to himself.

And now all thefe Reafonings from the common Advantages of our Nature, bear fo hard upon the Minds of finful Men, and carry fuch Conviction with them, that fome to make themselves eafy in their licentious Way of Living, will find out a Way to be rid of them, by denying the very Foundation of them, viz. that Man hath any fuch Advantages of Reason and Free-will above the Beafts, as is commonly pretended and believed. There are witty Men, who think they have discovered a rare Secret, if they feem to fay, that the Souls of Birds and Beasts, and all living Creatures, have a notable Share of Reafon and Free-will, and we do but arrogate to our felves what dotli not belong to us, while we pretend to the only Glory of thefe Faculties; and for this Purpose perhaps they will fhew the Induftry of one fort of Creatures, the Subtilty of fome, the Sagacity and Teachableness of others for the attaining of their End, and all this to prove that we are made for no high. er an End than they, and are under the Obligations of fearing God, and reftraining our Appetites by the Rules of Religion, not more than they, and that the best End we can purfue is that of fatisfying our Appetites of Bodily Eafe and Pleasure, as they do. Hitherto Mankind indeed (except perhaps Bb 3 the