Abernathy - Houston-Packer Collection BX9178.A33 S4 1748 v.3

72 The Ways of Llrífdorn, S E R M. accompany the pralice of fincere religion; III. that is, which arife from the teflimony of an approving confcience, and the hope of the glory of God ; we may confider thefe, I fay, in comparifon with other pleafures which are oppofite to them, and which continually folicit our affections and our pur- fuit. For feeing the human nature is not capable of all kinds of delight at once, it is reafonable for us to make the bell our choice; and feeing the pleafures of wifdom and of fin are utterly inconfiflent, fo that of necef- iity we mull hold to the one, and refufe the other, the true queflion, in order to our be- ing rightly determined, is, which of the two kinds are the moft worthy, and in all re- fpefts the moft eligible ? It would be a vain attempt to perfuade men that there is no real pleafure in the gratification of their fenfes and the appetites of human nature; to argue that the hungry feel no fatisfadlion in meats, and the thirfly in refrefhing drinks, is to argue againft fenfe, and experience will quickly fhow the vanity of filch reafoning ; Nay, it may be acknowledged farther, that voluptuous men, the lafcivious and the in- temperate, have by an habitual indulging of their inclinations, and by vicious cufloms, railed

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