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SSO
STIRPRIZE IN
DEATH.
[DTSC.
TIT.
expresses
it,
Luke
xvi.
S.
These will
be
the conse-
quences
of
our guilt and
folly,
if
we
are
found
in
a
dead
sleep
of
sin, when
our
Lord
comes
to
call us from this
mortal
state.
Secondly,
let
us
spend
a
few
thoughts,
also,
upon the
dangerous and unhappy circumstances
of
those,
of
whom
we
may
"
have
some
reason
to
hope they have
once begun religion
in
good
earnest,
and are
made spi-
ritually
alive,
but
have
indulged themselves
in
drowsi-
ness,
and worn
out
the
latter
end
of
their
days in
a
care-
less,
secure,
and slothful frame
of
spirit."
1.
If
they have had the
principle
of
vital religion
wrought
in
their
hearts;
yet "
by
these
criminal slumbers
they darken, or
lose
their
evidences of-grace, and,
by
this
means, they
cut
themselves
off
from
the
sweet reflec-
tions and
comforts
of
it
on
a
dying bed,
when
they have
most need
of
them."
They
know
not whether
they
are
the
children
of God
or
no,
and are
in
anxious confusion
and distressing fear They
have scarce any plain proofs
öf
their
conversion to God, and the evidences
of true
christianity ready
at
hand,
when all
are
little enough
to
support their
spirits
:
They
have
not
used themselves to
search
for
them
by
self
enquiry, and
to keep them in
their
sight,
and
therefore
they
are
missing in this
im-
portant
hour
:
They
have
not
been wont to live
upon
their
heavenly
hopes,
and
they
cannot
be found,
when
they
want
them, to
rest upon
in
death. They
die,
there-
fore,
almost
like sinners,
though
they may perhaps
have
been
once 'converted
to holiness,
and
there
may be
a
root of
grace
remaining
in them
;
and
the reason
is,
be-
cause they have
lived
too much
as
sinners
do:
They
have
given too
great
and
criminal an indulgence
to the vain
and
worldly cares, or
the
trifling
amusements
of
this
life
;
these have engrossed almost all
their
thoughts and
their
time,
and therefore,
in
the day
of
death, they
fall
under terrors
and
painful apprehensions
of
a doubtful
eternity
just
at
hand.
If
we
have
not
walked closely
with
God
in
this
world,
we may
well
be
afraid to
appear
before
him
in
the
next.
If
we
have
not maintained a
coesta.nt converse
with
Jesus
our Saviour
by
holy
exercises
of faith
and
hope,
it
is
no
wonder
if
we
are
not
so
ready
with chearfulness
and
joy
to resign
our
departing
spirits into
his
hand.
It
2