amazing circumftance of his fins, that he was fo diligent and induftrious to recommend and propagate them; not like thofe of old that hated the light, but those the prophet mentions, Ifaiah iii. 9. "who declare their fin as Sodom, and hide it not ; "that take it upon their shoulders, and bind it to them as a crown;" framing arguments for fin, making profelytes to it, and writing panegyrics upon vice.

Nay, fo confirmed was he in fin, that he oftentimes almost died a martyr for it. God was pleafed fometimes to punifh him with the effects of his folly; yet, till now, (he confeffed,) they had no power to melt him into true repentance; or, if at any time he had fome lucid intervals from his folly and madness, yet, alas! how fhort and tranfitory were they! All that goodness was but as a morning cloud, and as the early dew that vanishes away: he still returned to the fame excess of riot; and that with fo much the more greedinefs, the longer he had fafted from it.

And yet, even this defperate finner, that one would think had made a covenant with death, and was at an agreement with hell, and just upon the brink of them both, God, to magnify the riches of his grace and mercy, was pleased to snatch as a brand out of the fire: as St. Paul, though "before 66 a blafphemer, a perfecutor, and injurious, yet obtained

"tained mercy, that in him Chrift Jefus might. "fhew forth all long-fuffering, for a pattern to "them that should hereafter believe on him, to "everlasting life." 1 Tim. i. 13, 16. So God. ftruck him to the ground, as it were by a light from heaven, and a voice of thunder round about him: infomuch that now the fcales fell from his eyes,`as they did from St. Paul's; his ftony heart was opened, and streams of tears gufhed out, the bitter but wholefome tears of true repentance.

And, that this may appear to be so, I think it neceffary to account for these two things.

that it was not barely

fear of death; but the

I. For the means of it; the effect of fick nefs, or the hand of God alfo working in them and by them manifeftly.

}

II. For the fincerity of it; which though none but God, that fees the heart, can tell certainly, yet man even also may and ought to believe it; not only in the judgement of charity, but of moral justice, from all evident figns of it, which were poffible to be given by one in his condition.

And ift. For the means or method of his repentance. That which prepared the way for it was a fharp and painful ficknefs, with which God was pleased to visit him; the way which the Almighty often takes to reduce the wandering finner to the knowledge of God and himfelf. "I will be unto

"Ephraim

"Ephraim as a lion, and as a young lion unto the << house of Judah'; I, even I, will tear and go away, " and none shall relieve him; I will go and return "to my place, till they acknowledge their offence "and feek my face; and in their affliction they will "feek me early." Hof. v. 14, 15.

And, though to forfake our fins then, when we can no longer enjoy them, feems to be rather the effect of impotency and neceffity than of choice, and fo not fo acceptable or praise-worthy, yet we find God Almighty often uses the one to bring about the other, and improves a forced abftinence® from fin into a fettled lothing and a true deteftation

of it.

It is true, there are such stubborn natures, that, like clay, are rather hardened by the fire of afflictions: ungracious children, that fly in the face of their heavenly Father in the very inftant when he is correcting them; or it may be like thofe children who promise wonders then, but presently after forget all. Such as thefe we have defcribed, Pfal. lxxvii. 34, 35, 36, 37. "When he flew them, "then they fought him, and they returned and en"quired early after God; then they remembered "that God was their rock, and that the high God "was their Redeemer; nevertheless they did but "flatter him with their mouth, and lied unto him "with their tongues, for their heart was not right

" with

3

"with him, neither continued they ftedfast in his "covenant." And it is probable this has been the cafe formerly of this perfon. But there was an evident difference betwixt the effects of this fickness upon him and many others before. He had other fentiments of things now, (he told me,) and acted upon quite different principles: he was not vexed with it as it was painful, or hindered him from his fins, which he would have rolled under his tongue all the while, and longed again to be at; but he fubmitted patiently to it, accepting it as the hand of God; and was thankful, bleffing and praifing God not only in but for his extremities. There was now no curfing, no railing or reproaches to his fervants or those about him, which in other fickneffes were their ufual entertainment: but he treated them with all the meeknefs and patience in the world, begging. pardon frequently of the meaneft of them but for a hafty word, which the extremity of his fickness, and. the sharpness of his pain, might eafily force from him. His prayers were not so much for ease, or health, or a continuance in life, as for grace, and faith, and perfect refignation to the will of God. So that I think we may not only charitably but juftly conclude, that his fick nefs was not the chief ingredient, but, through the grace of God, an effectual

means,

of a true though late repentance, as will best be judged by the marks I am now to give you

of

of the fincerity of it: for which I am, in the next place, to account.

II. And it was the power of Divine Grace, and of that only, that broke through all thofe obftacles that usually attend a man in his circumftances; that God (who is a God of infinite compaffion and forbearance) allowed him leifure and opportunity for repentance; that he awakened him from his spiritual flumber by a pungent fickness; that he gave him fuch a prefence of mind, as both to provide prudently for his worldly affairs, and yet not to be diftracted or diverted by them from the thoughts of a better world; that lengthened out his day of grace, and accompanied the ordinary means of falvation, and weak miniftry of his word, with the convincing and over-ruling power of his Spirit to his confcience; which word of God came to him quick and powerful, fharper than a two-edged fword, piercing even to the dividing a funder of his foul and spirit; and at last the Spirit of God witnessed to his fpirit that now he was become one of the children of God.

Now, if the thief upon the crofs (an inftance too much abused) was therefore accepted, becaufe accompanied with all the effects of a fincere convert which his condition was capable of; as confeffion of Chrift's divinity in the midft of the blafphemies of pharifees and his own lewd companion, and de

fertion