OP PUBLIC EVENTS. 547 royal Psalmist; Ps. cxxiii. 2. We should watch every motion of the right -hand of our God, and all the pro- gress of his footsteps inhis government of the world, that we may learn our proper business thence ; " that in the time of prosperity we may rejoice in the Lord, and in the hour of adversity we may set ourselves to consider our ways and humble ourselves before him ;" Ec. vii. 14. It is the word of God that appoints us the general rules of duty and religion ; but it is providence that leads us to apply these rules, and to put them into daily practice. Thus having enquired what sort of notice a christian ought to take of the hand of God in the events of life, we proceed to shew In the second place, " what is the guilt and danger of neglecting this pious practice : And that may be corn- prized chiefly under the fourfollowing heads. 1. Those who take no notice of the operations of God in the affairs of human life, G4 abuse their reason and, their better powers, both as men and as christians." Our eyes and our ears and other senses of the body are given us to take notice of the outward objects that sur- round us which are the springs of pain or. pleasure ; and these we enjoy in common with the beasts of the earth : The birds and the fishes, the creeping things, and every little insect employ their corporeal powers for the same purposes ; but man was made with nobler principles, and. capacitated to discover and discern the hand of God his Creator, and to observe his supreme direction of all the, affairs of mankind : And if we consider ourselves as christians, we .profess still a diviner principle of converse, with God. How mean, how ignoble and degenerate a, thing is it then, for men who profess christianity, to look no further, than the objects,of sense, and sink themselves to the rank of the brute creation ? Man, though he be raised by the station of his nature, to a more honour- able character than the rest of the animals; yet if he re- main without understanding, and thoughtless of his God, he becomes like the beasts that perish; Ps. xlix. 20.. " Brute beasts, which, as the apostle says, are made to be destroyed ;" 2 Pet. ii. 12. So men that " regard not the operation of the Lord, nor consider the work of his hands, the Lord will destroy them and not build them Up;" Ps. $xviil. 5. 2N2
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