III. hand!-Such prospects purify the mind, SERMON at the same time that they gladden it. They prevent the good man from setting too high a value on his present possessions ; and thereby assist him in maintaining, amidst the temptations of worldly pleasure, that command of himself which is so essential to the wise and temperate enjoyment of prosperity. It is the fate of all human pleasures, by continuance, to fade; of most of them, to cloy. Hence, in the most prosperous state, there are frequent intervals of languor, and even of dejection. There are vacuities in the happiest life, which it is not in the power of the world to fill up. What relief so adapted to those vacant or dejected periods, as the pleasing hopes which arise from immortality? How barren and imperfect that prosperity, which can have recourse to no such subsidiary comfort, in order to animate the stagnation of vulgar life, and to supply the insufficiency of worldly pleasures! Worldly prosperity declines with declining life. In youth its relish was brisk and poignant. It becomes more F 3 sober SERMON sober as life advances; and flattens as III. life descends. He who lately overflowed with cheerful spirits and high hopes, begins to look back with heaviness on the days of former years. He thinks of his old companions who are gone; and reviews past scenes, more agreeable than any which are likely to return. The activity of pursuit is weakened. The gaiety of amusement is fled. The gratifications of sense languish. When his accustomed pleasures, one after another, thus steal treacherously away, what can he, who is an utter stranger to religion, and to the hope of Heaven, substitute in their place? -But even in that drooping period, the promises and hopes of religion support the spirits of a good man till the latest hour. His leaf, it is said in the text, shall not wither. It shall not be in the power of time to blast his prosperity: But old age shall receive him into a quiet retreat; where if lively sensations fail, gentle pleasures remain to soothe him. That hope of immortality, which formerly improved his other enjoyments, now in a great measure supplies their absence. Its importance rises, He SERMON in proportion as its object draws near. THUS I have shewn, I hope, with full evidence, what material ingredients religion and a good conscience are in the prosperity of life. Separated from them, prosperity, how fair soever it may seem to the world, is insipid, nay frequently noxious to the possessor: United with them, it rises into a real blessing bestowed by God upon man. God giveth to a man that is good in his sight, wisdom, and knowledge, and joy; but to the sinner he giveth sore travail, to gather, and to heap up, that he may give to him that is good before God *. III. SERMON III. ALLOW me now to conclude the subject, with representing to the prosperous men of the world, those crimes and miseries into which the abuse of their condition is likely to betray them, and calling upon them to beware of the dangers with which they are threatened. It is unfortunate for mankind, that those situations which favour pleasure, are too generally adverse to virtue. Virtue requires internal government and discipline; prosperity relaxes the mind, and inflames. the passions. Virtue is supported by a regard to what is future; prosperity attaches us wholly to what is present. The characteristics of virtue, are modesty and humility; the most common attendants of prosperity, are pride and presumption. One should think, that prosperity would prove the strongest incitement to remember and to honour that God who bestows it. Yet such is the perverseness of human náture, that it proves much oftener the motive to impiety. The changes of the world call the attention of men to an invisible Power. But a train of events proceeding according to their wish, leads them to nothing The Su- SERMON nothing beyond what they see. They III. 1 |