,DISCOURSE III. ß3 tion to so loud and repeated warnings ? I am awake indeed, but I can see nothing round about me but distresses and discourage - ments, and my soul sinks within me, and my heart dies at the thoughts of appearing before God." It is a wise and just observation among christians, though it is a very common one, that the scriptures give us one instance of a penitent saved in his dying hour, and that is, " the thief upon the cross ;" Luke xxiii. 43. that so none might utterly despair ; but there is but one such instance given, that none might presume. The work of repentance is too difficult, and too important a thing, to be left to the languors of a dying bed, and the tumults and flutterings of thought, which attend such a late conviction. There can be hardly any effectual proofs given of the sincerity of such repentings : And I am verily persuaded there are few of them sincere ; for we have often found these violent emotions of conscience vanish again, if the sinner has happened to recover his health : They seem to be merely the wild perplexities and struggles of nature averse to misery, rather than averse to sin: Their renouncing their former lusts on the very borders of hell and destruction, is more like the vehement and irregular efforts of a drowning creature, constrained. to let go a most beloved object, and taking eager hold of any plank for safety, rather than the calm, and reasonable, and voluntary designs of a mariner, who forsakes his earthly joys, ventures himself in a ship that is offered him, and sets sail for the hea- venly country. I never will pronounce such efforts and endea- vours desperate, lest I limit the grace of God, which is unbound- ed ; but I can give very little encouragement for hope to a hour or two of this vehement and tumultuous penitence, on the very brink of damnation. Judas repented, but his agonies of soul hurried him to hasten his own death, that he might go to his own place: And there is abundance of such kind of repent- ing, in every corner of hell ; that is a deep and dreadful pit, whence there is no redemption, though there are millions of such sort of penitents ; it is a strong and dark prison, where no beam of comfort ever shines, where bitter anguish and mourning for sins past, is no evangelical repentance, but everlasting and hope- less sorrow. II. " Those that are found sleeping at the hour of death, are carried away at once from all their sensual pursuits and en- joyments, which were their chosen portion, and their highest happiness." At once they lose all their golden dreams, and their chief good is, as it were, snatched away from them at once, and for ever. " Tney stand on slippery places, they are brought to destruction in a moment, and all their former joys are like a dream, when one awaketh, and finds himself beset round with terrors." Ps. lxxiii. 18 -20. F2
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