chifed and inftructed in the principles of religion, efpecially concerning his faith and repentance, and his uptaking of the covenant of grace, and the method of pardon and falvation through the righteousness of Christ apprehended by faith. And it may be proper to demand his affent to fome of the fundamental truths of Chriftianity, or his anfwer to fuch questions as thefe: First, Do you believe in God the Father, Son, and Holy Ghoft, one God in three perfons, the Maker and Governor of the world? 2 Do you believe that Jefus Chrift, who affumed our nature, obeyed the law, died on the cross, rofe from the dead, and afcended to heaven, is the eternal Son of God, and the only Saviour of finners? 3. Are you fenfible that you are a loft finner by Adam's fall, and, befides that, guilty of innumerable actual fins; and that you have broken God's holy commandments in thoughts, words and deeds, and, for fo doing, do deferve God's wrath both in this life and that which is to come? 4. Are you truly grieved and forry for breaking God's law, neglecting his worship, mifpending your time, and purfuing the vanities of the world? And would you do as you have done, or live otherwise if you were to begin your life again? 5. How do you think to get your guilt removed, your fins pardoned, and your peace made up with God? Are you defirous from your heart to be reconciled to God through Jefus Chrift, the bleffed Peace-maker? 6. Do you heartily approve of the gospel-method of reconciliation, by the righteoufnefs and facrifice offered by the Lord Jefus Chrift, as your Surety, in your name and ftead? And is your foul defirous to chufe and accept of Chrift for your Mediator and Saviour, in all his offices, of Prophet, Prieft, and King? 7. Do you renounce all confidence in any other, all dependence on your duties and righteoufnefs, and put your whole truft and confidence in Chrift, and the merits of his death, and blood, faying, "Whom have I heaven but thee? and there is none in all the earth that I defire befides thee." Do you believe that there is no falvation in any other, and that there is no name under heaven whereby you can be faved, but Jefus Chrift only? 8. Do VOL. I.

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you defire to be wholly renewed and fanctified by vir tue of Chrift's blood, and to fhew forth the reality of your faith by good works and a holy life, for the time you have to live in the world? And, as an evidence thereof, are you willing to reftore what you have taken wrongfully from any, and to forgive all wrongs done to you by any, and caft out all malice or hatred you have borne to any, and afk forgiveness of any you have in. jured? 9. Do you believe that Chrift is coming at the laft day to judge all the world, both the quick and the dead, whom he fhall then raise from the grave, and that your dead body fhall rife with the reft? 10. Do you believe the immortality of the foul, and its living in a separate ftate after death, and that the fouls of believers do immediately pass into glory, where they shall ever be with the Lord?

V. In dealing with the fick, you are to separate between the precious and the vile, and to make a difference between the converted and the unconverted. And feeing different applications are requifite, you are, according to your knowledge, to ftudy to fuit your counfels, admonitions and prayers, to their ftate and condition; not ufing the fame words to the ungodly as you use to the godly, left you flatter them with ill grounded hopes that their ftate is fafe, while they are firangers to a work of regeneration. That great truth is to be declared to all, that, "Unless a man be born again, he cannot fee the kingdom of God." O it is dangerous to speak peace, where God fpeaks war.

VI. If the fick perfon feem to be fecure, or have not a due a sense of his fins; endeavours must be used to convince him of the guilt, pollution, and danger of them, in order to his humiliation. Prefumptuous finners are not to be flattered, left we betray their fouls into eternal ruin, and fo their blood be required at our hand. No fond love, no flavifh fear, must keep us from telling them the hazards of their prefent itate. Their fecure confcience must be awakened to see the demerit of fin, and the terribleness of the juftice of a fin-revenging God, before whom no Chriftiefs impenitent finner can ftand: This is neceffary in order to a finner's

finner's difcovering his loft cafe in himfelf, and his fleeing to Chrift for refuge. It is God's method, first to caft down the foul before he lift it up; to plough the heart by conviction, before he caft in the feed of confolation.

VII. If the fick perfon hath ftudied to walk uprightly, but is at prefent difcouraged upon account of the fharpness of the rod, Satan's temptations, the guilt of fin, fear of death, or the like; then fuitable counfels, refolutions, and comforts, are to be' tendered, in order to his fettlement and fupport. Particularly, he may be told, that fharp rods are no ways inconfiftent with divine love; nay, frequently, they are a fign of it for, as ftanding waters turn corrupt, becaufe they have no current; and those who are not poured from veffel to veffel, their tafle remains, and their scent is not changed; therefore God, in order to take away the fcent of the corrupt nature from us, is pleafed to change us from state to ftate, by crofles and ficknefs to falvation. And as Noah's ark, the higher it was toffed with the flood, the nearer it mounted towards heaven; fo the fanctified foul, the more it is exercifed with affliction, the nearer it is lifted towards God. Again, it is proper to fet before him the freeness and fulness of God's grace, the fufficiency of righteoufnels in Chrift, and his rich and gracious offers in the gofpel; by which we are affured, that all who repent, and believe with their heart in God's mercy through Chrift, renouncing their own righteoufnefs, fhall not perish in their fins, but have life and falvation in him, and that believers in Christ are affured of victory over Satan, death and all their enemies, becaufe Chrift their head hath by his crofs conquered the devil, unftinged death, triumphed over the grave, and obtained victory for all his members; fo that neither life nor death, principalities nor powers, fhall be able to feparate them from God's love in Christ.

VIII. If a fick man be fo tempted and troubled in confcience, that he is in hazard of defpairing of God's mercy; it is neceffary to inform him of the greatness and infiniteness of God's mercy, that the most notori

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ous finners have been pardoned and faved by it, and it is fill offered in the gofpel to the vileft of finners. Though God forefaw all the fins which the world would commit, yet thefe did not hinder him from loving the world fo, that he gave his only begotten Son to death, to fave as many as would believe and repent: fo that the fins of one man can never hinder God from loving his foul, and forgiving his fins, when he fincerely defires to repent and believe. The cry of the most grievous fins that are recorded (fuch as thofe of Sodom) could never reach higher than unto heaven, Gen. xix. 13. But David affures us, Pfal. cviii. 4. that the mercy of God is great, and reaches up higher than the heavens, fo that it over toppeth the greatest of all our fins. If the mercy of God be greater than all his works, it must furely be greater than all our fins.

Again, lay before him the infinite virtue of Christ's blood: Why? It is not the blood of a mere man, but the blood of God, Acts xx. 28. And, are there any fins fo great, or guilt fo heinous, but the blood of God can wash away? This was godly Crammer's fupport that day he fuffered martyrdom, when his fin of renouncing the Proteftant doctrine ftared him in the face: Surely (faid he) God was made flefb, and shed his blood, not for leffer fins only, but for great fins also." He was fadly difcouraged, and wept abundantly, till he eyed this meritorious blood, and then he took heart, and died with courage. O this price was fo great, that it could have merited pardon for the fins of all the devils in hell, as well as for all the men on earth, though every one of them had been red as crimson. Yea, the leaft drop of this blood is of more merit to procure the mercy of God for our falvation, than all our fins can be of force to provoke the wrath of God for our damnation; why? The greatest of our fins are but the fins of a man, but the leaft drop of Christ's blood is the blood of God.

Moreover, let him be put in mind of the willingness and readiness of our Redeemer to receive all finners that came to him in the days of his flesh, though driven to him by fickness and affliction; fo that he never put any of

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them away without their errand, that came crying for mercy. Nay; he many times fought out objects of his mercy, that were not thinking of coming to him, as fhowed before. Obferve the gentleness of our Lord's carriage to Judas himself, in calling him friend, after his most treacherous dealing, Mat. xxvi. 50. " Friend (faid he) wherefore art thou come?" Had wretched Judas laid hold on the word friend out of the mouth of Christ, as Benhadad did the word brother, from the mouth of Ahab; doubtlefs Julas fhould have found the God of Ifrael more merciful than Benhadad found the king of Ifrael.

Lafly, Let him confider, that to defpair of God's mercy cafts the greatest dishonour upon the Divine Majefty, and is a fin more heinous than all the fins which we have before committed: Why? It doth charge the great God as guilty of perjury, who hath folemnly fworn, that he defires not the death of a finner, but rather that he should repent and live, Ezek. xxxiii. 11. God was more difpleafed with Cain for defpairing of his mercy, than for murdering of his brother: and with Judas for hanging himfelf, than for betraying his mafter: Why? Because that by their defpair they would make the fins of mortal men greater than the infinite mercy of the eternal God.

DIRECT. IV. Be earnest in Prayer to God for your Friends, when Sick or Dying. Pray with them and for them.

FREQUENTLY fick perfons are fo difquieted with pain and trouble, that they are out of cafe to pray for themselves, and therefore they have the more need of the prayers of others. David fafted and prayed for his enemies, when they were fick, Pfal. xxx. 13. much more ought we to pray for our friends in that cafe. Never did they need our prayers fo much, as when they are called to enter upon an unchangeable condition, to go to their long home, even that place wherein they mult abide for ever. Now they are in the land

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