78 AN H1137CLC ATTCMIPT, &C. the remembrance of the various instances of his grace lost out of your minds ? Do ye stagger at every new difficulty ? Are you frighted at every fresh trial ? Have ye been trained up in the school of Christ so long, and learned so many lessons of faith and godliness, and are ye still beginning again, still learn- ing thefirst principles of duty and hope ? What have ye done with all your experiences of the favours of heaven and the rich grace of Christ ? You whose tottering tabernacles give you notice that they are ready tòfall into,the dust, have you attaineda greater assu- rance of the building of God not made with hands, that is re- served in heavenforyou? Have you learned to say with holy triumph, We know that if this earthly house be dissolved, there is a nobler habitation waiting for us on high ? Have you this heavenly inheritance always in view and hope, and are you ready to be dislodged from your dwelling on earth, tliat you may dwell with Christ in heaven ? Are ye confident and willing rather to be absent from the body, and to be present with the Lord, and that upon just and solid grounds ? O it is high time for you who are so near to eternity, to get your whole souls loosened from the little affairs of this mortal state ! You who make daily approaches to heaven, it is time to he weaned from every thing on earth, and be dead to all that is not divine : you should begin as it were toput on the vestments of paradise and immortality, and to diffuse a savour of the holiness and the joy of that place round about you, and let the world know that you are near to God. Or can you wear out whole days and weeks together, and never speak of Christ, of heaven, of the pleasures at the right- hand of God,- and the happiness to be found in his presence ? And do you suffer this little remnant of life to wear out daily without some efforts for the honour of your heavenly Father and your Savior ? Can you pass your time away amongst men, and talk busily about their affairs without any lively or joyful thoughts of the business and the blessedness of the saints on high, and the spirits of the just made perfect ? Are you so near to the place where God and his Son Jesus dwell in their brightest glories, and say nothing of them to your friends round about you ? So near the borders of the upper world, and yet cleave to the dust as others do, and discover as much attachment to earthly things, as those who are in the midst of mortal amuse- ments; and in the vigour of human life ? If this be your tem- per still, what apology can be made for you ? what pretence of an excuse ? Howmuch do you dishonour religion in old age, and disgrace the profession of fifty or threescore years ? You who have walked with God so long through this wil- derness, and have been fed and clothed and supported all the way, who have been delivered from many enemies and many
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