Se. II, THfi WATCHFUL CHRISTIAN IYYING IN rBACT. 1'0 found sleeping, and hurried away from earth into the invisible world, in the midst of our foolish dreams of golden vanity. Dreadful indeed, to have a young thoughtless creature carried off the stage sleeping, and dead in trespasses and sins : Let those that are drunk with wine fall asleep upon the top of a mast in the mid- dle of the sea, where the winds and the waves, are tos- sing and roaring all areund them ; let a mad man, who hast lost his reason, lie down to sleep upon the edge of a precipice, where a pit of fire and brimstone is burning beneath him, and ready to receive his fall ; but let not young sinners, whose rational powers are in exercise, and whose life is every moment, a Mere uncertainty, venture to go on in their dangerous slumbers, while the wrath of God, and eternal misery attend them, if they die before they are awake. It is granted, that no power beneath that which is di- ' line, can eflèctually quicken a dead soul, and awaken it into a divine life. It is the work of God, "to quicken the dead;" Rom. iv. 17. Eph. ii. 5. It is the Son of God, who is the `Plight and life of the world ;" John i. 4. to whom " the Father has given this quickening power ;" John v. 26. He calls sinners, to awaken them from their deadly sleep ; Eph, v. 14. And "they live by him, as he lives by the Father ;" John vi. 57. He awakens dead souls to life by the same "living Spirit, which shall quicken their mortal bodies, and raise them from the grave ;" Rom. viii. 9, 11, 13. 2 Cor. iii. 3. which ,Sph it he " bath received from the Father ;" John iii. 34. And, on this account, we are to seek the vital influences of this grace from heaven by constant aí}d importunate prayer. Yet, in my text, as well as in ether scriptures, awaking out of Sleep, and watching unto righteousness, is represented as our duty, and we are to exert all our natural powers, with holy fervency for this "end, while our daily petitions draw down from heaven the promised aids of grace. Our diligence in duty, and our dependence on the di- vine power and mercy, are happily and effectuallyjoined in the command of our Saviour, on this very occasion, in one of his parables ; Mark'xiii. 33. " Watch and pray, for ye know not when the tithe is; that the Lord will come. And again, chapter xiv. 38. "-Watch and pray, 'that ye enter not into "temptation." Trust fot in your
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