sMtMON XXXt 427 fall under, without repinings and inward vexations, and without anyoutward tokens ofsinking and despondency. When we sustain heavy sorrows, or anguish of the flesh, without anywild and unreasonable groanings of nature, without rage and unbecoming resentment, without tumult and confusion of spirit. And this should be the temper of our souls, and our christian conduct, whether the sufferings which we feel, arise from the immediate hand of God, or from the injustice and violenceof men. In the second place, I come to represent the various occa- sions that we shall find in the christian life, forthe exercise of this holy courage, and that under bothkinds ofit; viz, the active and the passive, or that which consists in doing, and that which consists in suffering; and I shall enlarge-upon 'each of them in a practical way. Active valour is necessary for a professor of the christian faith : And when and wheresoever divine providence gives us any just occasions for the exercise of this sort offortitude, let no christian refuse them, or. shamefully : withdraw from his duty. Theoccasions we have for it are such as these : I. Whenwe are called to"profess and practise strict piety, even under the special view and notice of profane sinners. Per- haps our dwelling may be cast among profligate wretches, who live without God in the world ; but we must not be afraid to own, that we fear the great God, and that we worship that awful name, which their blasphemies affiont and vilify. Nor must we be ashamed to let theworld know, that we cannot pass a day without calling upon Our God; and that prayer is as necéssary to us, as our daily food. It is strange and monstrous that it should ever be accounted a matter of shame among creatures to acknowledge the God that made them, or that it should ever need any courage to profess homage and adoration to ourCreator ! What dege- nerate times do we live in, that it should require sème fortitude to tell the world, that we who are creatures confess a God ! And yet sometimes even this very fortitude is wanting, and we are contented to look like atheists, lest we should be thought religious. Base cowardise ! and degenerate times indeed ! II. When we happen into the company of infidels and apos- tates fromchristianity, who throw their impiousjests onthe gospel of Christ, we may find a plain call of providence to stand up for hisname and honour. It is true, there are few: of us who are sent to travel beyond the seas, and to engage in necessary converse about religion with heathens; bit I hinted before, that infidelity is a growingmis- chief of the present age, even in our own land, It seems to be a spreading infection, and how far the great God may suffer it to prevail, heonly knows. There are multitudes already that have '>nade shipwreck of the faith of Christ, and betake themselves
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