The CONCLUSION of the WHOLE, a ND now, my brethern, let me know your minds : What do you intend to do? will you go on and die ? Or, will you upon a thorough and speedy conversion, and lay hold on eternal ļife? How long will ye linger in Sodom? “ How long will ye halt between two opinions ?” i Kings xviii. 21. Are you not yet resolved whether Christ or Barabbas, whether bliss or torment, whether the land of Cabul, 1 Kings ix. 13. or the paradise of God be the better choice? Is it a disputable case, whether the Abana and Pharpar of Damascus, be better than all the streams of Eden; or whether the vile puddle of fin, is to be prefersed before the water of live, clear as crystal, proceeding out of the throne of God, and of the Lamb? --Can the world, in good earnef, do that for you, which Christ can-Will it stand by you to eternity ?-Will pleasures, lands, titles, or treafures defcend with you ? Psalm xlix. 17; 1 Tim. vi. 7. If not, had you not need look after fome: what that will ? „What mean you to stand wavering? "to be off and on! Foolith children! hov long will ye stick between the womb and the world? Shall I lead you at last no farther than Agrippa, but almoft persuaded; why, you are for ever lost if left there; as good not at all, as not altogether Christians. You are half in the mind to give over your former negligent life, and set to a frict and holy course : you could wish you were as some others are, and could do as they can do: How long will you rest in idle wishes and fruitless purposes ? When will you come to a fixed, firm, and full resolve? Do not you see how Satan gulls you, by tempting you to delays? How long hath he drawn you on in the way of perdition?-How many years have you been purposing to mend !-What if God Thould have taken you off all this while ? Well, put me not off with a dilatory answer : Tell me not of hereafter, I must have your immediate consent : If you be not now resolved, while the Lord is treating with you, and courting you, much less are you like to be hereafter, when these impressions are worn out, and you are har. dened through the deceitfulness of sin. Will you give me your hands ? Will you open the doors, and receive the Lord Jesus the full and ready possesfion? Will you put your names into his covenant? Will you subscribe? What do you resolve upon ? If you are still upon your delays, my labour is loft, and all is like to come to nothing.– Fain I would that you should now put in your adventures. Come, cast in your lot, make your choice. “ Now is the accepted time, now is the day of salvation : To-day if you will hear his (s voice.' Why should not this be the day from whence thou shouldest be able to date thy happiness? Why shouldest thou veature a day longer in this dangerous and dreadful condition? What if God should this night require thy soul? “ O that “ thou mightest know in this thy day, the things " that belong to thy peace, before they be hid from ** thine eyes,” Luke xix. 42. This is thy day, and it is but a day, John ix. 4. Others have had their. day, and have received their doom, and now art thou brought upon the stage of this world, here to thou art act thy part for the whole eternity. Remember thou art now upon thy good behaviour for everlasting; if thou make not a wise choice now, undone for ever. Look what thy present choice is, such must thine eternal conditions be, Luke x. 42. and xvi. 25. Prov. i. 27: 29. And is it true indeed ? Is life and death at thy choice? Yea, it is as true as truth is, Deut. xiii. 14. why then, what hinders but that thou shouldest be happy? Nothing doth or can hinder but thine own wilful neglect or refulal. It was the speech of the Eunuch to Philip, “ See here is water, what doth “ hinder me to be baptized ? So I may say to thee, See here is Christ, here is mercy, pardon, and life; what hinders but that thou shouldest be pardoned, and saved? One of the martyrs, as he was praying at the stake, had his' pardon set by him in a box (which indeed he refused deservedly, because upon unworthy terms) but here the terms are most honourable and easy: finner! wilt thou burn with thy pardon by thee? Why, do but forthwith, give up thy consent to Christ, to renounce thy sins, deny thyself, take up the yoke and the cross, and thou carriest the day; Christ is thine, pardon, peace, life, and blessedness, all are thine: And is not this an offer worth embracing ? Why shouldest thou hifitate, or doubtfully dispute about the cafe? Is it not past controversy whether God, be better than fin, and glory than vanity? Why shouldest thou forsake thy own mercies, and sin against thy own life? When wilt thou shake off thy sloth, and lay by thine excuses? “ Boaft not thyself of to morrow so thou knoweft not where this night may lodge thee,” Prov. xxvii, 1. How mo 4 Beloved, now the holy Spirit is striving with you; he will not always strive. Haft thou not felt thine heart warmed by the Word, and been almoft persuaded to leave off thy fins and come in to God? Haft thou not felt some good motions in thy mind, wherein thou hast been warned of thy danger, and told what thy careless course would end in? It may be thou art like young Samuel, who, when the Lord called once and again, knew not the voice of the Lord, 1 Sam. iii. 6. 7.; but these motions and items are the offers, and essays, and callings, and strivings of the Spirit: O, take the advantage of the ride and know the day of thy visitation. Now the Lord Jesus stretcheth wide his arms to receive you; be beseecheth you by us. vingly, how meltingly, how pitifully, how compassionately he calleth? The church is put into a Tudden extasy upon the found of his voice, si The os voice of my beloved !” Cant. ii. 8. O, wilt thou turn a deaf ear to his voice! It is not the voice that breaketh the cedars, and maketh the mountains skip like a calf: that shaketh the wilderness, and divideth the flames of fire ; it is not Sinai's thunder, but a soft and still voice : It is not the voice of Mount Ebal, a voice of cursing and terror, but the voice of Mount Gerezim, the voice of blefling, and of glad tidings of good things: It is not the voice of the trumpet, nor the voice of war, but a meffage of peace from the King of Peace Eph. vi. 15. 2 Cor. v. 18. 20. Methinks it should be with thee as with the spouse, My soul failed “ when he spake," Cant. v, 6. I may say unto thee, O finner! as Martha to her sister, « The “ Master is come and he calleth for thec,” Jobn xi. 28. O, now with Mary arise quickly, and come ünito him! How sweet are his invitations! He cria eth in the open concourse, “ If any man thirst, let s him come unto me and drink,” Jobr vii. 37: Prov. i, 21. He broaches his own budy for thee, O come and lay thy mouth to his side! How free is he! he excludech none : " Whosoever will, let “ him come and take the water of life freely,” Rev. xxii. 19. “ Whofo is fimple, let him turn in “ hither. Come eat of my bread, drink of the wine “ that I have mingled. Forsake the foolish and " live,” Prov. ix. 4.6. “Come unto me, &c. “ take my yoke upon you, and learn of me, and ye shall find rest to your louls,” Matt. xi. 28, 29. “ Him that cometh to me I will in no wise cast out," John vi. 37. How doth he bemoan the obitinate refu. fer? “ o Jerusalem! Jerusalem! how often would “ I have gathered thy children, as a hen gathereth s her chickens under her wings, and ye would not!" Matt. xxiii. 37 • Behold me, behold me; I have o stretched out my hands all the day to a rebellious “people,” Ifa. Ixv. 1, 2. O b. persuaded now at last to throw yourselves into the arms of love. Behold, ye fons of men, the Lord Jesus hath thrown open the prison, and now he cometh to you, as the magiitrates once to them, Acis xvi. 39. and beseeches you to come out. If it were from a palace or paradise that Christ did call you, it were no wonder if you were unwilling; (and yet how easily was Adam deluded thence!) but it is from your prilon, Sirs; from your cnains, from the dungeon, from darkness, that he calleth you, Ija. xlii. 6. 7.; and will you not come? He calls you unto liberty, Gal. v. 13. and will you not hearken? His yoke is easy, his laws are liberty, his service N |