.DISCOURSE IX. 101 Britain ; look over the seas into popish kingdoms ; take a view of the cursed courts of inquisition in Spain, Portugal, and Italy ; behold the weapons, the scourges, the racks, the machines of torture and engines of cruelty, devised by the barbarous and in- human wit of men, to constrain the saints to renounce their faith, and dishonour their Saviour. See the slow fires where the mar - tyrs have been roasted to death with lingering torment : These are seasons of terrible trial indeed, whereby the malice of Satan and antichrist would force the servants of God, and the followers of the Lamb, into sinful compliances with their idolatry, or a desertion of their post of duty : But the Spirit of God has sup - ported,his children to bear a glorious testimony to pure and un- defiled religion ; and they have seemed to mock the rage of their, tormentors, to defy all the stings of pain, and triumphed over all their vain attempts, to compel them to sin against their God. One would sometimes be ready to wonder, that a God of infinite mercy and compassion should suffer his own dear child- ren to be tried in so terrible a manner as this ; but unsearchable wisdom is with him, and he does not give an account to men of all the reasons and the rules of his conduct. This has been his method of providence with his saints at special seasons, under the Jewish and the christian dispensations, and perhaps under all the dispensations of God to men, from the days of Cain and Abel to the present hour. Our blessed Lord has, given us many warnings of it in his word by his own mouth, and by all his three apostles, Paul, Peter, and John : They that will live godly in Christ Jesus, shall suffer persecution ;; 2 Tim. iii. 12. Think it not strange therefore concerning the fiery trial I Pet, iv. 12. The devil, by his wicked agents, shall cast some of you into pri- son, that ye may be .tried ; and ye shall have tribulation test days, but fear none of the things which thou shalt suffer: Be thou faithful unto death, and 1 will give thee a crown of life; Rev. ii. 10. But blessed be God, that this world is the only state of such trials. As soon as the state of probation is finished, the state of recompence begins. Such hard and painful exercises to try the virtues of the saints, have no place in that world which was not made for a stage of trial and conflict, but a palace of glorious reward. " Heaven is the place where crowns and prizes are distributed to all those blessed ones who have endured tempta- tion," and who have been found faithfitl to the death. These sharp and dreadful combats with pain, have no'place among con- querors, who have finished their warfare, and have begun their triumph. 4. " Pain is sent us by the hand of providence to teach us many a lesson both of truth and duty, which perhaps we should never have learned so well without it." This sharp sensation
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