dations*: And as the Danger is much Greater from an Unseen Enemy, his Attempts are more Dangerous, and harder to be Avoided by us, because his Way and Manner of Working upon us is much Unknown

to us.

These are the Three Grand Deceivers against whom our Church has taught us to Pray-From All the Deceits of the World, the Flesh, and the Devil Good Lord Deliver us.

Thus do many Men go on all their Life long, often Wishing, and sometimes Purposing, to Lead a New Life, yet still fuffering themselves to be Prevail'd upon, and led away with divers Lusts and Pleasures.

III.

But IIIdly, Though they will not be brought to Live the Life of the Righteous, yet they would be glad to Dye with him, and have their Last End like His.

So long as we are in the Body, the Judgment will in some Measure be Influenced by its Affections and Lufts. But when we are parting from the Body, and Death is coming to Set the Soul at Liberty, we Consider Things

* Illicita Defideria immittit; Objicit Oculis irritabiles Formas, suggeritque Fomenta; Et Vitiis pabulum fubminiftrat: Tùm intimis Visceribus Stimulos omnes conturbat & commovet; Et Naturalem illum incitat atque inflammat Ardorem; Donec irretitum Hominem implicatumque decipiat. Lactant.

L. 6.

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more

more truly and impartially; We then shake off our Former Prejudices, and are fittest to pass Judgment on our selves *. And what do we Then think of our Sins? How do we Then Stand affected to them? Do we Then find Relish, or Pleasure, or Comfort in them? Nay, are they not Then Hateful to us, and loathsome in our Eyes? Is not the very Remembrance of them grievous unto us, and the Burden of them Intolerable? Many Men labour and toil Night and Day; Cheat others and Starve themselves, and Slave themfelves all their Days; And after All, after a Wearisome Bufy Life, would be glad at last, with Judas, when they see what they have done, to throw back the Price of Blood, the Wages of Unrighteousness, could they but fo get rid of the Guilt of it; And to part with all their Gains at Once, the Fruit of all the Toil and Drudgery, the Craft and Cunning of their whole Lives, for a Quiet Confcience, and an Easy Death bed.

Though they may have strengthened themselves in their Wickedness, and done what they can to harden themselves in Unbelief, yet when Death comes to open their Eyes, (which the God of this World hath blinded) they can then no longer be Unbelievers. But

fuch Believers Believe not to their Comfort, but to their Dread. They only, like their Father the Devil, Believe and Tremble: And cannot help Believing to their Confusion, what they would never be perfuaded to Believe to their Salvation..

2.

And are not All Men under such Circumstances of the fame Mind? Do not all agree in their Judgment then? It may please God indeed sometimes, when the Sinner has long stood it out against Convictions, and many fecret Checks and Admonitions of the Holy Spirit, (for Example to the World of his great Indignation against Presumption and Obstinacy in Sin) to Punish such a One with the greatest of all his Plagues, a Hardned Tim. iv. Heart, and a Conscience feared, as with a hot Iron. Such Miferable Wretches having Eph. iv. the Understanding darkned, and alienated from the Life of God, because of the Blindness of their Hearts, and being past Feeling, may have little Sense of their Danger; and may poffibly at last Dye, as they have Lived, Stupid and Thoughtless in their Sins. But such Instances of Sinners Unconcerned at the Dying Hour, are, God be thanked, what we feldom meet with. The Common Apprehenfions of All Men, the Learned and the Ignorant, the Rich and the Poor, are generally the fame Then: Whatever their Lives Have been, they then All wish that they Had been Good and Virtuous. If they have had any

7

a

any serious Fits, and spent any Hours of their Lives well, in Prayers and Reading the : Holy Scriptures, and other Duties of Religion; Or any Part of their Estates in Good Works, and Alms Deeds; Do they not call Them to Mind with more Satisfaction and Pleasure, than all their Frolicks, and Follies, and extravagant Vices? Then is the Remembrance of One Day Spent in the Court of Pf. lxxxiv. God's House, better than a Thousand Spent in the Tents of Ungodliness *.

And do not all the Death-bed Confessions, Declarations, and Resolutions, that we ever hear of, run the same Way? All against Impiety, and Vice? And All the Penitential Sighs and Groans, and Dying Exclamations that Men make, are they not all for the Sins of their Lives? For tho' Men may struggle with themselves, and may keep down Conscience, at an under, all their Life long; Yet an Unrelenting Atheist, that can boldly stand to his Principles, and glory in his Vice and Impieties, and defy God and Heaven, with his Dying Breath, is a Monster scarce to be heard of Once in an Age. Their Stout Hearts then come down, and many of them are Ready, in their Extremity, to fly to their Prayers, and would fain take Shelter in Reli

10, 11.

1

gion at laft, and seek Comfort from it, thơ they had Neglected, perhaps Derided it, all their Life before. They know they have often Abused, and done enough to Forfeit the Privilege of the Sanctuary; but in their Distress, having no other Refuge to flee unto, they are willing to Try its Mercy; And if it Refuse them its Protection, they can but Dye, as Joab did, at the Horns of the Altar.

This then is the End of Wickedness and Vice, Trouble, Sorrow, and Repentance.

But now on the other Side; Have we ever known, or heard of any, that have Repented of their Virtues? When a Man Has Lived Soberly, Righteously, and Godlily in the World, are his Temperance, Justice and Piety, ever attended with any Penal Confequences? Does the Remembrance of These ever yield any Bitter Fruits, or fill the Mind with Remorse and Horror? Does the Remembrance of our Watchings, and Fastings, and Mortifications? Do the Hours we have spent with God in Secret? In Prayers and Meditations; Or in any Exercises of Virtue or Piety? Do these (I fay) fit Uneasy on the Mind? Or cause any Sad Reflections to Afflict and Torment us at the last? And here we might give the Challenge to the Atheist, and defy them All, to find out but One Single Instance of this kind, either from their own Knowledge, or from all the Records of

*