2%0 A CAVEAT AGAINST INFIDELITY. never had the gospel, surely there is none will be allowed to those who have so blasphemed and abused it. III. Ifsincerity in the practice pfa false religion were suffi- cient toprocure the divine favour, then ridiculous andinhuman superstitions of all kinds, blood and murder, andcruelty, would be effectual means to obtain the favour of God ; for these have been practised by many people in the world, and that with great zeal and sincerity, and sometimesas a piece of religious worship. Can you imagine, that theancient heathens were not sincere in the practice of their ceremonies, in their laborious and painful rites of worship, Ivhen they put themselves to so much self-denial and torment in the performances of them ? Think ofthe dreadful. and bloody penances to which some ofthem havedevoted themselves i Think of their cutting and wounding of their own flesh with knives, and lancets : So did the prophets of Baal, whether they, were Jews or heathens 1 Kings viii. 18. Think of the agonies of parents, when they offered their own children to brazen idols, and burned them in terrible sacrifice to Moloch : Count over the " thousands of rams, and the rivers of wine and oil, the fruit of their body . for their transgression, and the first-born of their flesh for the sin of their soul ;" Micah vi. 7. Think of Curtius and the Decii among the old Romans, that devoted themselves to death, to appease the anger of their gods. Think of the wretched devotees at présent in Malabar, who throw them- selves under the chariot wheels of a heavy idol drawn by a hundred men, that theymay' be crushed to death, .and thus pay honour to their god survey all these, and then tell me whether these worshippers are not sincere or no. What haveyou to chew as signals and tokens ofyour sincerity in religion, comparable to these poor blind heathens ? And yet after all, can you ever suppose these bloody and dreadful works of devotion, these consecrated acts of murder were acceptable to the great God, or could pro- cure peace with heaven, under a pretence of their sincerity ? Let us survey another scene of madness, which yet appears to be sincere zeal among some of the professed enemies of the people of God in all ages. When they have been sending Chris- tians to the lions, to slaughter and death, when theyhave given up thebeloved sons and daughters of God to fire and sword, to fa- mine and nakedness ; to the teeth and talons of wild beasts ; some of these bigots.seem to have been sincere in' their designs to honour the powers of heaven, and to offer these barbarous sacri fices to appease the god of their country. The Romans imagin- ed that the tolerationof Christians, who were blasphemers of their gods, brought plagues and distresses upon their armies and kingdoms, and therefore they devoted them to death to please the god whom they worshipped. Now will any of our deists tell us, that these inhuman persecutors were accepted of God,
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