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SERM. part attended with miferable infirmities; II. so that if we have no hopes of fome better being beyond the grave, our whole state here is of so little consequence, that perhaps, it had been as well for us to have had no being at all. Since therefore, there is a life to come after this short and imperfect state, as reason and religion assure us, it must be of the utmost importance to secure our happiness there; for that is all the comfortable view we can have; and unless we can extend our thoughts to it, there can be no fatisfaction to the foul. This ought to be the great business of this transitory life, for it is as our Saviour justly expresses it, the one thing needful, Here we ought to use our diligence and industry, that whatever be our lot in mortality, whether profperous or adverse, we may not fail of being happy in eternity. And for this we are to run all hazard, whenever there can be any competition between the things in this world, and the hopes of glory and happiness in another. We are to imitate the merchant in the parable, whom our Saviour represented as felling all that he had to purchase the pearl of great price, because by that he had the probability of

II.

making his whole fortune at once, and SERM. being enriched for ever. We ought to follow the example of those worthies St. Paul recounts in his epistle to the Hebrews, who difregarding the pleasures of fin, that are but for a season, and confefsing that they were strangers and pilgrims in the earth, fought after a better country, that is an heavenly. For as as we have nothing here to fix upon, nothing that will continue with us, it behoves us to endeavour to secure to ourselves something that may remain with us beyond all our present acquisitions. The things of this world we are, indeed, so far to regard, as our natural neceffities oblige us; but we are not to spend the whole of our time and care upon them. It is only the happiness of our fouls in the invisible world, upon which we ought to exert the strength and vigour of our thoughts. Let us therefore, look toward that in the first place; and then as to other things, whether we succeed in them or not, it will make but little difference in the end. Seek ye first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, says our Saviour, and all these things shall be added

unto you.

D 4

SERM.

41

SERMON III.

The Eternity of Gop.

PSAL. XC. 2.

Before the mountains were brought forth, or ever thou hadst formed the earth and the world; even from everlasting to everlafting thou art God.

T

HE Eternity of God is one of SERM, those adorable attributes, which

justly fill us with awful sentiments of his existence and perfection. It is one of those truths, that are not easily comprehenfible to our imagination, but of which we are so demonstrably certain, that the evidence of it cannot be resisted. And it has always been assented to by all, who have acknowledged his being, as evident from the nature of his existence.

In the holy scriptures, which always confirm, and illustrate our rational sentiments of him, it is very often expressed in the most sublime and affecting man

ner,

III.

SERM. ner, in order to give us suitable notions III. of his excellent and transcendent nature.

Thus in the text, it is asserted very plainly, that he exifted from everlasting, before all material productions whatsoever. Before the mountains were brought forth, or ever thou hadst formed the earth and the world; even from everlasting to everlasting thou art God. In confideration of which divine perfection, we have in this pfalm fome reflections on the brevity and fluctuating state of human life; and, indeed, the whole of it seems to be a meditation on our minute and tranfitory condition in this world, when compared to the Eternity of God; after which, the good Pfalmist makes some pious prayers for his pity and compaffion to our frailties.

In the following discourse, I fhall en

deavour

:

I. To represent to you, that this attribute of Eternity must belong to God, and to him only. Then

II. To make some observations, that may be proper to assift our understanding. And

In the last place, I shall make a few practical reflections.

I. Then

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