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CHRISTIAN MORALITY,
VIZ.
[SERM. XXIII.
our
souls were
inured
to the
meditation
of
such
sublime
wonders
as
these;
we
should
not
easily immerse
our-
selves in trifles
and
fooleries.
Again,
let
us
meditate
on
the
more
awful
doctrines,
the
more solemn and dreadful
truths of our
religion,
and
these
will be
an effectual
restraint
to
a
vain
temper
of
mind.
Let
us
think on the
justice of
God manifested
in the
destruction
of
sinners
in all
ages,
when it
ap-
peared
in a
prodigious
flood
of
water,
and
with
a deluge
of
ruin testified against the wickedness
of
the
old world
;
and
when
it
came down in flaming
fire
upon
Sodom,
and
upon
the cities
of
the plain.
Let
us
meditate
on
the
wrath
of
God,
that
has
been revealed
in
numerous in-
stances against
all
the ungodliness and unrighteousness
of
men.
Let
us
contemplate
that
divine and severe
jus-
tice,
that appeared
in
the
sufferings
and
death
of
God's
own
Son,
when
it
pleased the
Father
to bruise
him,
and
to make
his
soul
an
offering
for
sin.
Let
us
think
of
his
agonies
in
the garden,
and
on
the
cross,
when he bore
the
weight
of
our
iniquities, and stood
in
the place
of
sinners.
Let
us send
our thoughts
down to the regions
of
death
and
hell,
and behold
the fallen angels
bound in
chains
of
darkness, and groaning
under present tor-
ments;
yet waiting
for the day
of
greater
vengeance.
Let
us
think
with
ourselves what millions
of
our
fellow
-
sinners, the
sons
and daughters
of
Adam, lie
there ba-
nished
from
the
,presence
of
the Lord, and tormented
with
fire in
their
consciences
without
remedy, and with-
out
hope,
and
say,
why
are not
we
there too
?
Let
us
often look forward
to
the
awful
moment
of
our
death, and
the
time
of our departure
from
all the
flatter-
ing
scenes
of
this
present
world. This
will
put
a damp
upon the vainest
mind,
and hang
with
a painful weight
upon
the sons
of
mirth
and
levity.
This
will
be
a
means
to
restrain
us
from
that
foolish
and
trifling behaviour,
which otherwise
our
tempers
might incline
us to.
And
let
us
remember
the solemn -hour when
we
must stand
before the
tribunal
of
our Lord
Jesus
Christ, divested
of
all
these
gaudy
shews
of
life, in which
we
are
now
ready
to
pride ourselves, and there
we
must
receive
a
sentence without repeal,
which shall send
us
to
heaven
or
to hell
at
once,
and
fix
our
everlasting state. These
are terrors
or glories too
solemn to be trifled
with;
these
are
thoughts
that
will
hold
our
souls awake
and serious;