LU 'E AY` Fd:YTH. 4$5- fire, when he 'discharged' the cannons ofhis terrible comminations. If you fall not down, you shall find that the lightning is attended with the thunder, and execution will be done before you are aware. If there were any doubt of the things unseen, yet you know it is past all doubt that there is nothing else that is durable and worthy of your estimation and regard. You must be knights and gentlemen but a little while ; speak but a few words more, and you will have spoke your last. When you have slept a few nights more, you must sleep till the resurrection awake you, (as to the flesh.) Then where are your pleasant habitations and con- tents? Your honors aiid attendance ? Is a day that is spent, or a life that is extinct, any thing or nothing ? Is there any sweet- ness in a feast that was. eaten, or drink that was drank;.or time that Was spent in sports and mirth a year ago? Certainly a known vanity should not be preferred before a probable endless joy. But when we have certainty as well as excellency and eternity, to set against certain, transitory vanity, what room is left for fur- ther deliberation ? Whether 'we should prefer the sun before a squib, or a flash oflightning that suddenly leaaves us in the dark, one would think should be an easy question to resolve. Up, then ! and workwhile it is day ; and let us run and strive with all;our might! Heaven is at hand as sure as if you saw it. You are certain you can be no losers by the choice. You part with nothing for all things. You escape the tearing of your heart, by submitting to the scratching of a brier, You that will bear the opening of a vein for the cure of a fever, and will not forbear a necessary journey for the barking of..a dog, or the blowing of the wind; O leap not into .hell to escape the stinking breath of a scorner! Part not with God; with. conscience, and with heaven, to save your purses or your flesh. Choose not a merry way to misery, before a prudent, sober preparation for a'perfect, everlast- ing joy. You would not prefer a merry cup before à kingdom. You would let go a lesser delight or commodity for a greater here. Thus a greater sin can forbid the exercises of a less ; and shall not endless boy Weigh do1,bn a brutish lust or pleasure ? Ifyou love pleasure, take that which is true, and full, and dura- ble. For all that he calleth you to repentance and mortification, and necessary strictness, there is none that is more for your pleas- ure' and delight than God ; or else he would not offer you the rivers of pleasure that are at his right hand, nor himself to be your perpetual delight. Ifyou corm Into a room where are varie- ty of pictures, and one is gravely reading or meditating, and an- other, with a cup or. huh* in his hand,, is profusely laughing, with a gaping, grinning mouth ; would you take the latter or the former to be the picture of a wise and happy man ? Do you approve of the
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