'SnCTION i'I. 89 bave been reduced, it may be, from plentiful circumstances tó a more scanty diet, to coarser cloathiug and a meaner appearance, and are deprived of some of the conveniences of life ; have you learned to live without them with an easy and peacefulheart ? Is your spirit weaned from those grandeurs or shewish appearances of life which are by no toscani necessary to true happiness ? Are you able to say with St. Paul ; Philip. iv. 11, 12. I know both how to be abased and howto abound; every where and in all things I am instructed both to be full and to be hungry ;--for J hate learned in whatsoever state Í am, therewith to be content. Or perhaps you have been trained top all your days in strait circumstances, you have laboured hard to support nature, and you have been freed from the temptations that attend riches and grandeur ; have you learned to live without envy against the rich and the great ; envy, the natural vice of mortals in mean circum- stances? Have you depended on theprovidence of God for your daily bread on earth, and learned this holy lesson of faith ? Have you taken so much the morecare to secure to yourselves treasures in heaven that neverfade, and the bread that nourishes to eternal life? Are you among the number of those who are humble and lowly as your.circumstan es require ? Have you been taught to be poor in spirit ? You have had but few temptations to pride, have you therefore more effectually subdued this common iniquity of nature ? You have tasted few of the charms of this World, rnd have had no strong allurements to earth, is your heart there- fore more loose from earthly things ? Is your substance laid up ¢n heaven, and are your actions set on things that are onhigh 2 Have you any solid evidences that your name is written among the number of those who are poor in this world, rich in faith, .and heirs of the kingdom ? Are there any of the sorrows or difficulties that any of us have passed through in this world, that have made us eminently fit for a better ? Have any of the afflicting strokes of the hand of God made a sensible separation between us and our idols ? Or are we found in that rank of men ofwhom the prophet speaks in the name of God ; Jer. ii. 30. Irr vain have I smitten your children, they have received no correction: and whom the pro- phet complains of to God himself; Jer. vi. 3. 0 Lord, thou hast stricken them, but they have not grieved.; thou hast consumed ¿hem, but they have refused to receive instruction ; they have made their faces,harder than a rock, they have refused to return ? What if the blessed God should cast us out of his fatherly care, and say in the words in which he taught' the prophet Isaiah to address the Jews, Why should you be stricken -any more 2 Ye will revolt more and more ; Is. i. 5. How dreadful would the case be, if God should give us up to our owrr hearts' lusts, with- out any further instance of paternal discipline and love? What E3
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