136 A HOPEFUL YOUTH [SERM. Vitt. the eye sees you, it gives witness to you. But is this enough to depend upon for eternal life ? Perhaps you have borrowed part of the valuable qualities of that good man Job, you have delivered the poor that cry, and the fatherless that had none to help him; you have caused the widow's heart to sing for joy, and the blessing of him that wasready to perish, has come often upon you, Job xxix. 11, 12, 13. There is so much natural good- ness in your constitution, that leads you on, by a sweet instinct, to the practice of many charities : but this is not saving grace. If Jesus Christ himself were upon earth in this humbled state, he would look upon you, as man, and love you : but the holy God looks down from heaven, and beholds you as the object of his just and divine hatred, while you live in a state of vanity and sin, drunken with sensual pleasures, and at enmity with God. This sweetness of temper, that springs from your blood, and the happy mixture of humours ; or, at best, from the mere natural frame of your spirits, will never pass, upon the great tribunal, for holiness and inward religion. With all this charming appearance of virtues, these colours that look like heaven, you will be doomed to hell, and perpetual misery, unless there be found in you some nobler qualities, such as, love to God, morti- fication to this world, the knowledge and faith of Jesus Christ. If these be not the springs of your charity and love to men, you will not be secured from the condemn- ing sentence of the judge, nor from the companyof de- vils in the futureworld. But oh ! how will your soft and gentle natures bear the insult and rage of those malicious spirits ? Howwill your temper, that had something so lovely in it, sustain to be banished for ever from the world of love? to be for ever excluded from all the regions of peace and con- cord ? How will your souls endure the madness and contention, the envy and spite of wicked angels ? You that delighted on earth in the works of peace, what will ye do when your tender dispositions shall be hourly ruffled by the uproar and confusion of those dark re- gions ? and instead of the society of God and blessed spirits, ye shall be eternally vexed with the perverse tempers of your fellow-sinners, the sons of darkness ?
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