DISC. IT.) THE WATCHFUL CHRISTIAN DYING IN PEACE. 183 and actions, at once, by a lethargic stroke, or confounds them all by the delirious rovings of a fever ; the light of reason is eclipsed and darkened, the powers of the mind are all obstructed, or the languishings of nature haYe so enfeebled them, that either we cannot exercise them, to any spiritual purposes, or we are forbid to do it, for fear of counter-working the physician, increasing the ma lady, and hastening our death. Thus we are not capable of making any new preparation for the important wo rk of dying ; we can make use of none of the means of grace, nor do any thing more to secure an interest in the love of God, the salvation of Christ, and theblessings of heaven. This is a very dismal thought indeed. But the watch- ful christian hath this blessedness, that he is fit to receive the sentence of death in any form ; not lethargies., nor deliriums, nor languors of nature can destroy the seed of trace and religion in the heart, which were sown there in the days of health ; nor can any of the formidable attend- ants ofdeath cancel his former transactions with God and Christ about his immortal concerns. That great and momentous work was done before death appeared, or any of its attendants. He was not so unwise as to leave mat- ters, of infinite importance, at that dreadful .hazard : He is not now to begin to-seek after a lost Gad, nor to ¡begin his repentance for past sins : He is not now a stranger at the throne of grace, nor beginning to learn to pray : He is not now commencing his acquaintance with Jesus Christ, his Saviour, in the midst .of a tumult and hurry of thoughts and fears ; nor are the works of faith, and love, and holiness to be now begun. Dreadful work indeed, and infinitely hazardous ! To begin to be con- winced of sin on the borders of death, and to make our first enquiries after God and heaven upon the very brink ofhell ! To begin to ask for pardon when we can live in sin no longer ; to cry out, Jesus, save me, when the waves of the wrath of God are breaking in upon the drowning soul! Hopeless condition, and extreme wretch- edness ! To have all the hard work of conversion to go - .through under the sinkings .of feeble nature, and to begin, the exercises of virtueand godliness under the wild disor- ders of.reason ! What a madness is it to leave our infi- nite concvns at-such a horrible uncertainty ! [« Here this discourse may be divided."]
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