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great name's fake, be the principle of fuch actions, howfoever it may benefit others) it profiteth me nothing." This is the conftant language of the lively oracles of GOD. And, from them it is equally plain, that nothing has a greater tendency to beget and excite fuch an obediential love in us, than a serious and frequent confideration of the manifold mercies we receive time after time from the hands of our heavenly Father. The royal pfalmift, who had the honour of being filed, "the man after God's own heart," had an abundant experience of this. Hence it is, that whilft he is musing on the divine goodness, the fire of divine love kindles in his foul; and, out of the abundance of his heart, his mouth fpeaketh such grateful and extatic language as this. "What fhall I render unto the LORD for all his mercies? Bless the LORD, O my foul, and all that is within me, bless his holy name." And why?"who forgiveth all thine iniquities, who healeth all thy diseases, who redeemeth thy life from deftruction, who crowneth thee with loving kindness and tender mercies." And when the fame holy man of God had a mind to ftir up the people of the Jews to let about a national reformation, as the most weighty and prevailing argu ment he could make use of for that purpose, he lays before them, as it were, in a draught, many national mercies, and diftinguishing deliverances, which have been conferred upon and wrought out for them, by the most high GOD. The pfalm to which the words of our text belong, is a pregnant proof of this; it being a kind of epitome or compendium of the whole Jewish history: at least it contains an enumeration of many fignal and extraordinary bleffings the Ifraelites had received from GOD, and alfo the improvement they were in duty bound to make of them, “ Obferve his ftatutes and keep his laws."

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To run through all the particulars of the pfalm, or draw a parallel (which might with great ease and juftice be done) between God's dealings with us and the Ifraelites of old: To enumerate all the national mercies bestowed upon, and remarkable deliverances wrought out for the kingdoms of Great-Britain and Ireland, from the infant ftate of William the Norman to their prefent manhood, and more than Auguftan maturity, under the auspicious reign of our rightful Sovereign

King George the fecond; howsoever pleafing and profitable it might be at any other time, would, at this juncture, prove, if not an irkfote, yet' an unreafonable undertaking.

The occafion of the late folemnity, I mean the fuppreffion of a most horrid and unnatural rebellion, will afford more than fufficient matter for a difcourfe of this nature, and furnifh us with abundant motives to love and obey that glorious Jehovah, who giveth falvation unto kings, and delivers his people from the hurtful fword.

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Need I make an apology, before this auditory, if, in order to fee the greatnefs of our late deliverance, I fhould remind you of the many unfpeakable bleffings which we have for a courfe of years enjoyed, during the reign of his prefent Ma-. jefty, and the gentle, mild adminiftration under which we live? Without juftly incurring the cenfure of giving flattering titles, I believe all who have eyes to fee, and ears to hear, and afe but a little acquainted with our public affairs, must acknowledge, that we have one of the beft of Kings. It is now dve nineteen years fince he began to reign over us. w And yet, was he feated on a royal throne, and were all his fubjects placed before him, was he to addrefs them as Samuel once audreffed the sraelites, Behold here I am, old and grey-headed, witness agaifft me before the LORD, whofe ox have taken? Or whole as have I taken? Or, whom have I defrauded?"Who have T'oppreffed "They muft, if they would to im jante, make the fame anfwer as was given to Samuel, "To Hait not defrauded us, nor oppreffed us." What Tertullus, by way of Battery, faid to Felix, may with o the strictest id be applied to our lovereign, "By thee we enjoy great quietness, and very worthy deeds have been done. unto our nation by thy providence." He has been indeed Pater Patria, a father to our country, and though old and grey-headed, has jeoparded his precious life for us in the high places of the field. Nor has he lefs deferved the great and glorious title, which the LORD promifes, that kings fhould fuftain in the latter days, I mean, "a nurfing father of the church." For not only the Church of England, as by law established, but all denominations of chriftians whatfoever, have enjoyed their religious as well as civil liberties. As there has been no authorized oppreffion in the ftate, fo there VOL. V.

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has been no publicly allowed perfecution in the church. We breathe indeed in free air? as free (if not freer) both as to temporals and fpirituals, as any nation under heaven. Nor is the prospect likely to terminate in his majesty's death, which I pray God to defer. Our princeffes are difpofed of to proteftant powers. And we have great reafon to be affured, that the prefent heir apparent, and his confort, are like minded with their royal father. And I cannot help thinking, that it is a peculiar bleffing vouchsafed us by the King of kings, that his prefent Majefty has been continued fo long among us. For now, his immediate fucceffor (though his prefent fituation obliges him, as it were, to lie dormant) has great and glorious opportunities, which we have reason to think he daily improves, of obferving and weighing the national affairs, confidering the various steps and turns of government, and confequently of laying in a large fund of experience, to make him a wife and great prince, if ever GOD fhould call him to fway the British fceptre. Happy art thou, O England! Happy art thou, Q America, who on every fide art thus highly favoured!

But, alas! how foon would this happy scene have shifted, and a melancholy gloomy prospect have fucceeded in its room, had the rebels gained their point, and a popish abjured pretender been forced upon the British throne! For, fuppofing his birth not to be fpurious, (as we have great reafon to think it really was) what could we expect from one, defcended from a father, who, when Duke of York, put all Scotland into confufion; and afterwards, when crowned King of England, for his arbritrary and tyrannical government, both in church and ftate, was justly obliged to abdicate the throne, by the affertors of British liberty? Or, fuppofing the horrid plot, firft hatched in hell, and afterwards nurfed at Rome, had taken place; fuppofing, I fay, the old Pretender fhould have obtained the triple crown, and have transferred his pretended title (as it is reported he has done) to his eldest son, what was all this for, but that, by being advanced to the popedom, he might rule both fon and fubjects with lefs controul, and by their united intereft, keep the three kingdoms of England, Scotland, and Ireland, in greater vaffallage to the fee of Rome? Ever fince this unnatural rebellion broke out, I have looked

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upon the young Pretender as the phaeton of the prefent age. He is ambitiously and prefumptuously aiming to feat himself in the throne of our rightful fovereign King George, which he is no more capable of keeping, than Phaeton was to guide the chariot of the fun; and had he fucceeded in his attempt, like him, would only have fet the world on fire. It is true, to do him justice, he has deserved well of the Church of Rome, and, in all probability, will hereafter be canonized amongst the noble order of their fictitious faints. But, with what an iron rod we might expect to have been bruifed, had his troops been victorious, may eafily be gathered from those cruel orders faid to be found in the pockets of fome of his officers, "Give no quarters to the Elector's troops." Add to this, that there was great reafon to fufpect, that, upon the first news of the fuccefs of the rebels, a general maffacre was intended. So that if the LORD had not been on our fide, Great Britain, not to say America, would, in a few weeks or months, have been an Aceldama, a field of blood.

Befides, was a Popish Pretender to rule over us, instead of being represented by a free parliament, and governed by laws made by their confent, as we now are; we should shortly have had only the fhadow of one, and it may be, no parliament at all. This is the native product of a Popish government, and what the unhappy family, from which this young adventurer pretends he defcended, has always aimed at Arbitrary principles he has fucked in with his mother's milk, and if he had been fo honeft, inftead of that immature thotto upon his standard, Tandem triumphans, only to have put, Stet pro ratione Voluntas, he had given us a fhort, but true portrait of the nature of his intended, but blessed be GOD, now defeated reign. And why should I mention, that the finking of the national debt, or rending away the funded property of the people, and the diffolution of the prefent happy union between the two kingdoms, would have been the immediate confequences of his fuccefs, as he himself declares in his second manifefto, dated from Holy-rood House? These are evils, and great ones too; but then they are only evils of a temporary nature. They chiefly concern the body, and must necessarily terminate in the grave.

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But, alas! what an inundation of fpiritual mischiefs, would foon have overflowed the Church, and what unspeakable danger fhould we and our pofterity have been reduced to in respect to our better parts, our precious and immortal fouls? How foon would whole fwarms of monks, dominicans and friars, like fo many locufts, have overfpread and plagued the nation; with what winged fpeed would foreign titular bishops have pofted over, in order to take poffeffion of their respective fees? How quickly would our univerfities have been filled with youths who have been fent abroad by their Popish parents, in order to drink in all the fuperftitions of the church of Rome? What a speedy period would have been put to focieties of all kinds, for promoting christian knowledge, and propagating the gospel in foreign parts? How foon would our pulpits have every where been filled with thefe old antichriftian doctrines, free-will, meriting by works, tranfubftantiation, purgatory, works of fupererogation, paffiveobedience, non-refiftance, and all the other abominations. of the whore of Babylon? How foon would our proteftant charity fchools in England, Scotland and Ireland, have been pulled down, our Bibles forcibly taken from us, and ignorance every where fet up as the mother of devotion? How foon fhould we have been deprived of that invaluable bleffing, liberty of confcience, and been obliged to commence (what they falfely call) catholicks, or fubmit to all the tortures which a bigoted zeal, guided by the moft cruel principles, could poffibly invent? How foon would that mother of harlots have made herself once more drunk with the blood of the faints? And the whole tribe even of free-thinkers themfelves, been brought to this dilemma, either to die martyrs for, (although I never yet heard of one that did fo) or, contrary to all their most avowed principles, renounce their great Diana, unaffifted, unenlightened reafon? But I must have done, left while I am fpeaking against antichrift, I should unawares fall myfelf, and lead my hearers into an antichriftian Spirit. True and undefiled religion will regulate our zeal, and teach us to treat even the man of fin with no harfher language than that which the angel gave to his grand employer Satan, "The LORD rebuke thee."

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