which he so graciously offers. Abhorring, as they do, the name of devils, they yet spurn at those compassions which devils can never experience.

But let sinners remember, that there is justice as well as grace in the Most High. Justice shall avenge the contempt of mercy. Sinners feel some presage of that vengeance in their own guilty conscience. Fears of punishment often make them uneasy. They would gladly persuade themselves that these are but the terrors of a distempered fancy; but the day is coming when they will find them to be terrible realities; or if they want truth, it is because they are nothing to that vengeance which is their object. No passion is so tormenting as fear, but no fear can equal the power of God's anger.

The fear of sinners shall come upon them, and their feet shall slide in due time. It shall come like a desolating judgment, which with resistless violence lays waste a country. It shall come like a raging tempest, and a furious whirlwind, at once sweeping away every comfort and every hope. Then shall distress and anguish seize upon the mind of the stubborn transgressor, when he feels himself involved in remediless sorrow. This threatening will have its great accomplishment in the everlasting world, when the torrents of wrath shall swallow up the impenitent sinner, and the whirlwind of fury shall beat upon him with ceaseless violence. Wrath and indignation shall press him down in the lake of fire. Anguish and despair shall prey upon his soul, without the intermission of a moment; no ray of hope shall ever enter the abodes of darkness and of horror.

But will the poor victim of suffering find no pity from the Saviour of men? No! says the Spirit of God, "I will laugh at your calamity, and mock when your fear comes." With relentless eye shall he behold that

terrible vengeance which now overtakes the wicked. God has no pleasure in the death of the wicked, but rather that they should turn and live; yet he will take pleasure in the death of them that turn not, for in this manner is his justice glorified, and the dishonours done to his love repaired. God sometimes laughs at the trial of the innocent. He took pleasure in bruising his ownSon. He is comforted in the ruin of the wicked * But may not prayer avail in this deplorable condition? By no means.

Ver. 28. Then shall they call upon me, but I will not answer; they shall seek me early, (i. e. earnestly,) but they shall not find me.

The prayer of faith is ever heard, and they that seek God shall find him, when they seek him with all their heart. But the prayers of these desperate rebels, are like the howlings of a dog. They are cries extorted by strong necessity, and intolerable anguish. They are the cries of such as sought not the Lord whilst he was to be found, nor called on him whilst he was near.

Sinners miserably delude their own souls by proposing to live in the indulgence of their sins, and die in the exercise of repentance. True repentance is never too late, but late repentance is seldom true. Christ is not every day hanging on the cross, nor are thieves every day converted, and sent from the place of punishment to the paradise above.

Prayers are of no use in the eternal world. The day of grace is at an end, and the wretched shall cry in vain to the rocks and mountains to fall upon them, and hide them from the wrath of the Lord God and of the Lamb. Behold, now is the accepted time,

*Job ix. 23. Isa. liii. 10. and i. 24. Ezek. v. 13.

now the Lord waits to be gracious; but the day is coming that is cruel with wrath and fierce anguish; no place shall then be found for mercy, though sought with an ocean of tears. But why does he who takes pleasure in the voice of prayer, and listen so graciously to the cry of the supplicant,-why does he refuse to accept the petitions of those who are reduced to such an extremity of distress? The reason is,

Ver. 29, 30. For that they hated knowledge, and did not chuse the fear of the Lord. They would none of my counsel; they despised all my reproof.

The punishment is indeed tremendous, but the sin that causes it is atrocious. It is no less than a contempt and hatred of the counsels of the Lord. What is this but an undeniable proof of enmity against God himself? and will not God ease himself of his adversaries, and avenge himself of his enemies?

When men do not chuse the fear of the Lord, but prefer to it the base pleasures of sin, they give plain proof of their hatred to every thing that is good, and how can they escape the damnation of hell? If we think that the punishment is greater than the sin, the reason is, that we are under the power of iniquity. Self-love disposes the malefactor to prescribe to his judge. Let us impartially consider what malignity lies in impenitence, and what a complication of wickednesses is contained in the rejection of the great salvation, and we must acknowledge that the ruin of sinners is entirely owing to themselves. God is not to be blamed, but on the contrary, he will be eternally glorious as their avenger. His insulted mercy will be glorious in the punishment of its despisers. His justice shall shine in dispensing to the workers of iniquity the reward of their works: "< 'They despised all my reproof"

Ver. 31. Therefore shall they eat of the fruit of their own way, and be filled with their own devices.

They laughed at God's threatenings, as if they had been idle tales; and God shall laugh at them. They despised his counsels, and he shall despise their prayers. They were always the same, and continued unchanged after all admonition; and God will prove an immutable avenger, and will pay no regard to their cries for help. They took pleasure in sin, and God will take pleasure in punishing on account of it.

If a man plants and dresses a poisonous tree in his garden, it is just that he should be obliged to eat of its fruit. If our vine is the vine of Sodom, and our clusters the clusters of bitterness, we must leave our complaint on ourselves, if we must drink till we are drunken, and fall, and rise no more.

Sinners never think they have drunk deep enough of the poisoned cup of sin; but they shall at length be filled with it. Then shall it satiate them, when they find that intolerable misery is its native consequence. That cup which now delights the lover of evil, will then be found a cup of fury, and the wicked of the earth must drink it out to its bitterest dregs.

Ver. 32. For the turning away of the simple shall slay them, and the prosperity of fools shall destroy them.

The sins of men, unless pardoned through the blood of Christ, shall be their destruction; for he that turns away from God and his law, turns his back upon happiness ; and he that cherishes iniquity, warms in his bosom the most venomous of serpents *. Sinners owe their ruin to their wilful hardness of heart, their abuse of mercy, and their indifference about salvation.

It may be alleged, that sinners often prosper; but their prosperity is a part of their misery, for it will in

*Job xx. 11. &c.

crease their guilt, and render their damnation terrible. It nourishes their vicious affections, and tends to inspire them with pride and insolence, with sensuality and earthliness of mind. It is so strong a temptation, that our Lord has declared it almost impossible for a rich man to enter into the kingdom of God. This saying has been justified by fact. In times of persecution, the prosperous have been ordinarily the apostates who made shipwreck of faith, while the poor loved the world less, and stood out more firmly against temptation

If the prosperity of fools leads them to the indulgence of sin, and the neglect of holiness, it renders their damnation more certain and more dreadful. Their provocations are like those of the Israelites, who provoked God, by turning the Egyptian gold and silver, which he had given them, into an idol of jealousy. They are like the impious ingratitude of Jeroboam the son of Nebat, whom God raised to a throne, but who degraded God into the image of a four-footed beast. When the favours of God are turned into means and instruments of unrighteousness, Oh! what wrath is then treasured up against the day of wrath, and revelation of the righteous judgment of God!

But the prosperity of the wise has a very opposite tendency. When they act like themselves, it excites their gratitude; it stimulates them to serve God more effectually, and to do good to men more diligently. Wisdom teaches those who hearken to her voice, to make to themselves friends of the mammon of unrighteousness; so that while riches serve to expose the folly of the foolish, they prove a crown to the wise. But though the disciples of Wisdom should never attain prosperity, they are happy; for says Wisdom,

Ver. 33. But whoso hearkeneth unto me shall dwell safely, and be quiet from the fear of evil.