296 The NEW and COMPLETE LIFE of our BLESSED LORD. The blood of ,efus cleanfeth from all fin, i John i. y. What grace and favour is this ! Whocan dwelt upon the tranfporting theme too long! Now our way is plain before us, and the burden we are to bear is made 'eafy. No. fins are unpardonable, if re- pented of and forfaken; for it is faid, fuch (hall find mercy. You who have never yet regarded re- ligion, but purfued a courfe of vice and fenfuality all your lives long, are earneflly entreated to confider, that, though your conduit has been bate to the lag degree, your cafe is not defperate, far from it : the God whom you have fohighly offended, .commiferates your errors, is ever ready to extend his pardoning mercy to his molt degenerate creatures upon their repentance and reformation, and is in Chrifl fefus reconciling the world unto himfelf, not im- putingunto penitent finners their treffailks, 2 Cor. v. 19. Let the wicked therefore for- fake his way, and the unrighteous man his thoughts; and let him return unto the Lord, who will fo liberally extend his mercy to him ; and to our God, who will thus abun- dantly pardon; Ifaiah !v. y. What Rill further conduces to render the Chriftian religioneafy and delightful, is it's leading us to the perfekt, eternal life of heaven. It cannot be denied but that we may draw from the light of nature flrong prefumptions of a future Rate ; the prefent exigence does not look like an entire fcene, but rather like the infancy of human na- ture, which is capable of arrivingat a much higher degree of maturity : but whatever folid foundation the doctrine of a future gate may have in nature and reafon, cer- tain it is, that through the habitual ne- glekt of reflektion, and the force of irre- gular pallions, this doctrine was, before the coming of our bleffed Saviour, very much disfigured, ,and, in a great meafure, loll amongli the tonsof men, Tome ofwhom affirmed, that there was- neither refurrec- tion, angel, or fpirit. A future Date of rewards and punifh- ments was a matter of mere fpeculation and uncertainty in the Heathen world ; it was fometimes hoped for, fometimes doubt- ed of and fometimes abfolutely denied. The law of Mofes, though of divine ori- ginal, is chiefly enforced by promifes of temporal bleffings; and, even in the wri- tings of the prophets, a future immortality is very fparingly mentioned, and obfcureiy reprefented : but the doctrine ofour Savi- our hath brought life and immortality to light. In the gofpel we have a diftini ac- count of another world, attendedwith many engaging circumflances, about which the decifions ofreafon were dark and confuted. We have the teflimony of the Author of our religion, who was railed from the dead, acid who afterwards, in the pretence of his difciples, afcended into heaven. In the New Teflament it is exprefsly declared, that good men, when abfentfrom the body, areprrent with the Lord. Here we are affured of the refurrektion of the body in a glorious form, clothed with immortal vi- gour, tufted to the aktive nature of the animating fpirit, and affifling it's molt en- larged operations and inceffant.progrefs towards perfection. Here we are af- fured, that the righteous flail go into life everlafling; that they fhall enter into the kingdom of the heavenly Canaan, where no ignorance fhall cloud the underflanding, no vice diflurb the will. In thefe regions of perfektion, nothing but love fhall poffefs the foul ; nothing but gratitude employ the tongue : there the righteous (ball be united to an innumerable company ofangels, and to the general afèmbly and church of the fief born : there they fhall fee their exalted Redeemer at the right-hand of Omnipotence, and fit down with him on his throne : there they (hall be admitted into the immediate pretence of the Supreme Fountain of life and happinefs, and, be- holding his face, be changed into the fame image from glory to glory.Here language here imagination fails me ! It requires the genius; the knowledge, and the pen of an angel, to paint the happinefs, the bliti ful fcene of the new Jerufalem, which human
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