476 A, SERIOUS ADDRESS TO they will Only direct thee to the church -walls and communion-table ;'and, perhaps, if they see thee under dejection of spirit for thy sins, they will recommend the play- house, the card - table, or what they call "a cheerful glass." From such turn away, or they will persuade thee that repentance is melancholy ; conviction of sin, despair; and the love of God, en- thusiasm, 2 Tim. iii. 5. That they may not be able to laugh, or frown thee out of the way of salvation, dwell in thy thoughts on God's awful perfections. "Justice and judgments are the habitation of his throne." The unspotted re- splendant holiness beaming forth from him, as from an immensely glorious Sun of righteousness, will show thee thy sins, as innumerable as the flying motes dis- covered in a dusty room, where the natural sun can penetrate. Consider, that they are committed by a worm of earth, against the Majesty of heaven aid they will all appear to thee infinitely great; especially if thou measurest them and thyself by the true rule, the oracles of God casting away the three false standards which self - deceivers measure themselves by, namely, the good, opinion of their worldly- minded neighbours, the defective examples of their fellow sinners; and the flattering suggestions of their own blind self-lore. Follow the example of the noble l3ereans : Search the scriptures daily, whether these things are so," Acts xvii. 11. View, in that faithful mirror, the pic- ture both of the natural and of the regenerate man, and ask, thy conscience which thou resemblest most. If, imitating the godly man described in the first Psalm, thou "meditatest in the law of the Lord day and night ;" the straitness of the heavenly rile will soon show thee how very far gone thy thoughts, words, actions, tempers, and nature, are from original righteousness. To this meditation, add a frequent survey of the follies of thy childhood, the vanity of thy youth, the wòrldly-mindedness of thy riper years, the capital trans-
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