you from his avenging power? Or what mercy can ye expect from his hands, when you practised this iniquity in opposition to such light and evidence, as were diffused round about you in Great Britain ?

Perhaps you may laugh at the solemnity of this representation, and despise these scenes of terror as a painted fire; but methinks, if there be but a possibility that these things should be true, it would be a point of wisdom to provide against the dangers of such a dreadful hour: One would think it should awaken you, at least to be exceeding serious, sincere and diligent in surveying all the evidences of the gospel, before you dare reject such a Saviour, and expose yourselves to his indignation without hope. And where there are so many fair appearances of just and solid reasoning, as there are on the side of christianity, methinks you should not dare to give your lips a loose in profane ridicule and scorn: Nor should you suffer some little darknesses and difliculties in the books of the New Testament, to prevail against all the brighter discoveries of truth and argument, which support the religion of Christ. If you have any love to your souls, let me intreat you to consider, that however you may be disgusted at some things contained in the records of our holy religion, yet you can never prove that the religion itself is false in the main principles of it, as represented in those records: And remember this, that when your spirits are gone into the invisible world, if there you should find that Jesus whom ye once derided, to be Lord and Judge of all, there is no more sacrifice for sin, no rectification of you obstinate errors, no repentance, no pardon there; but you must perish under his just indignation, and your souls are lost for ever. But I turn my discourse to the disciples of the blessed Jesus, who believe in his name, and obey his gospel.

Happy persons are you indeed, and special favourites of heaven, if you have not only learned the great truths of christianity, and furnished your heads with them, but have felt your hearts powerfully impressed with them betimes, and have this glorious salvation begun within you. You have been awakened out of your mortal slumbers, and being convinced of your sinful state, and your danger of eternal death: you have seen the necessity of the pardoning grace of God, and an universal change in your own natures, in order to prepare you for eternal felicity; you have learned your own utter insufficiency to make satisfaction to divine justice for your own sins, and your inability to sanctify your own hearts, and to change them into holiness: therefore you have fled for refuge, to the hope that is set before you, and have found righteousness and grace in Christ Jesus. You have found the blood of atonement, and perfect righteousness in him to answer for your guilt, and to justify you in the sight of God, and the power of divine grace to work repentance in your hearts,

to create your souls anew, and form you to a divine temper: You have felt the sweet and constraining influence of the love of a dying Saviour, and found your hearts melted into holy and divine affections, and impressed with his sacred image: You are become his sincere and devoted seryants, zealous for his honour here on earth, and in some measure prepared for his enjoyment in heaven: Eternal life is begun within you, and you have a witness in yourselves that the gospel is true, even the record God has given of his Son, viz. that eternal life is to be found in Christ, for you have found it in him; 1 John v. 10. He that believes has the witness in himself and I trust the grace of God, who has wrought this glorious change in your natures, and has begun this divine salvation within you, will carry it on and fulfil it to the day of the Lord.

You have entered in this sacred contest, and are daily striving for the mastery against the world, the flesh and the devil; you have learned the rules that belong to this holy strife, and while you thus go on to strive lawfully, you may rejoice in hope and assurance of being crowned: You have been early ac quainted with the laws of the christian race, and you have seen the heavenly prize set before you in such a light, as that you are allured to wish and to run for it, as your highest hope and blessedness: You have set your faces toward heaven in the christian path, and have travelled on thus far in the way of faith, repentance and holiness. Hold on your way, maintain your ground; the crown is not far off, the end of all things is at hand; Jesus the Saviour, the Judge, and the Rewarder is at the door; see that no man take your crown; Rev. iii. 11.

THE HARMONY

OF

ALL THE RELIGIONS

WHICH GOD EVER PRESCRIBED TO MEN,

AND

ALL HIS DISPENSATIONS TOWARDS THEM.

PREFACE

TO" THE HARMONY OF ALL RELIGIONS."

RELIGION, in the most general sense of the word, signifies that veneration or

reverential regard, which man pays to God, his Maker. This veneration is diversified, according to the various perfections of the divine nature discovered to us, or the various relations in which we stand to God. All this is internal eligion, so far as it is found in the heart; but, it is also to be expressed outwardly in the life, by the tongue, or the several powers of action, according to he daily occasions which are given us in the course of providence. Religion in the heart includes in it, all that adoration we pay to God, because of his transcendent Majesty, our acknowledgment of all homage and obedience due to him, as our sovereign, our fear, our love, our imitation, our trust or dependance and submission, &c. according as we conceive of him, as the first and best of beings, as wise and powerful, as holy, just and merciful, as our rightful owner, Governor and Judge.

The outward expressions of these inward sentiments of the mind, whether ́în voice, gesture, or action, are to be regulated by the dictates of nature or reason, so far as that reaches; as for instance, nature seems to direct the lifting up of the hands and the eyes to God, in our solemn addresses to him, bowing the knee, or standing, or prostration in prayer to God, and laying hands on the head of another, when a blessing is pronounced on him, or implored for him; the voce of joy and singing is directed by the light of nature, in speaking the praises of God, or in our holy rejoicing before him; groaning and sighing, seems to be the language of nature also in our complaints to God; laying the hand upon the heart, denotes an appeal to God concerning our sincerity, &c.

These inward and reverential sentiments of the mind, may be also expressed by, or attended with a variety of other rites and forms, which God hath prescribed by revelation, in the several ages of his church: and God, only has a right to prescribe them; for he only knows in what manner he will, or he ought to be honoured or worshipped. Sometimes he has appointed abstinence from particular food, sometimes putting off the shoes from the feet, sometimes offering sacrifice to God by fire, sometimes washing or sprink ling with water or blood, sometimes eating or drinking as a holy festival, &c.

I add further, also, religion includes in it all our personal duties towards ourselves and our social duties towards our fellow-creatures, as well as our duties of piety towards God, so far as they are performed from a principle of veneration, obedience and love to our Creator: For this principle turns the common actions of life into religious actions, which otherwise would be esteemed but merely moral or virtuous. Scripture favours this representation. The apostle James seems to suppose it thus in the first chapter, last verse; pure religion and undefiled before God and the Father is this, to visit the fatherless and widows in their affiction, and to keep himself unspotted from the world. These moral actions done from a supreme regard to God, that is, before his sight, and as under his authority and approbation, render them truly religious.

When man was first created, and in his state of innocence, he was bound to fulfil all his duties towards God and man in perfection; and he had power to perform them; and these performances were his justifying righteousness in the sight of God, according to the law of nature and innocence. In his fallen or sinful state, he is still bound by the light of nature and reason, to pay the same duties towards God and man; and that in a perfect manner too, for