very dangerous and pernicious thing to men's souls, and is often spoken of as such in God's word; which was signified in that awful dispensation of God in turning Lot's wife into a pillar of salt, to be a standing emblem of the danger of looking back after one has set out in a way of religion. The ill to which they are subject, who lose their convictions, is not merely the loss of their convictions. Their convictions are not only a means of no good to them, but they turn to much ill. It would have been better for them, that they had never had them. For they are now set more remote from salvation than they were before. For having risen some considerable way towards heaven, and falling back, they sink lower, and farther down towards hell, than ever they were. The way to heaven is now blocked up with greater difficulties than ever it was. Their hearts now are become harder for light, and convictions being once conquered, they evermore are an occasion of a greater hardness of heart than there was before. Yea, there is no one thing whatsoever, which has so great a tendency to it. Man's heart is hardened by losing convictions, as iron is hardened by being heated and cooled. If you are awakened, and afterwards lose your convictions, it will be a harder thing to awaken you again. If there were only that you are growing older, there would be less probability of your being awakened again; for as person's grow older they grow less and less susceptible of convictions; evil habits grow stronger and more deeply rooted in the heart. You greatly offend God by quenching his spirit, and returning as a dog to his vomit, and as a sow that was washed to her wallowing in the mire. And there is danger that God will say concerning you, as he did concerning Jerusalem, Ezekiel xxiv. 13, "Because I have purged thee, and thou wast not purged, thou shalt not be purged from thy filthiness any more, till I have caused my fury to rest upon thee." If you return again to your wicked course, if you should go to hell at last, you will lament that ever you have had any convictions: you will find your punishment so much the heavier. And if you should be hereafter awakened, and set about striving for salvation, yet you will probably find harder work in it; you do but make work for yourself by your backsliding. You will not only have all to do over again which you have done, and which you must have done, if you had gone on, but there will be new work for repentance. There probably must be greater and more dreadful terrors; and it may be a much longer time spent in seeking and striving, a more difficult work with your own headstrong corruptions. If you were but sensible of one half of the disadvantages of backsliding, and the many woes and calamities in which it will involve you, you would be careful not to lose your convictions.

5. Consider the encouragement there is in scripture to persevere in seeking salvation, as in Hosea vi. 3. "Then shall we know, if we follow on to know the Lord." Thence we may gather, that God usually gives success to those who diligently, and constantly, and perseveringly seek conversion. And that you be the better directed in taking care not to lose your convictions, it is convenient that you should be aware of those things which are common occasions of persons losing their convictions. I shall therefore briefly mention some of them.

1. Persons falling into sin is very often the occasion of their losing their convictions. Some temptation prevails, so that they are drawn into some sin. Some lust upon some occasion has been stirred up, and they have been overcome by their sinful appetites, and have provoked God to anger. It may be they have been drawn into some criminal act of sensuality, and so have quenched the spirit. Or they have got into some quarrel with some persons. Their spirits are disturbed, and heated with malice and revenge, and they have acted sinfully, or have sinfully expressed themselves, and have driven away the spirit of God. These are the most ready ways to put an end to convictions.

2. Sometimes there happens some diverting occasion; there is some incident which for the present diverts their minds. Their minds are taken off from their business for a short time. They are drawn into company. It may be they see something which revives a desire of worldly enjoyments and entertainments; or they are engaged in some exercise and business, which diverts their minds. And so afterwards they are more careless than they were before. They are not so strict in attending private duties; and carelessness and stupidity by degrees steal upon them, till they wholly lose their convictions.

3. Some change in their circumstances takes off their minds from the concerns of their souls. Their minds are diverted by the new circumstances with which they are attended; or are taken up with new pleasures and enjoyments, or with new cares and business, in which they are involved. It may be they grow richer. They prosper in the world, and their worldly good things crowd in, and take possession of their minds. Or worldly cares are increased upon them, and they have so many things to look after, that their minds are taken up, and they have not time to look after their souls.

SERMON III.

HOSEA ii. 15.

SEPTEMBER, 1737.

And I will give her her vineyards from thence, and the valley of Achor for a door of hope: and she shall sing there, as in the days of her youth, and as in the day when she came up out of the land of Egypt.

IN the context, the church of Israel is first threatened with the awful desolation which God was about to bring upon her for her dealing so falsely and treacherously with God; because though, in the bold language of the prophet, she had been married to God, she had yet gone after other lovers, and had committed adultery with them. "For she said, I will go after my lovers, that give me my bread, and my water, my wool and my flax, mine oil and my drink." Therefore God threatened that he would strip her naked, and set her as in the day that she was born, and make her as a wilderness, and set her like a dry land, and slay her with thirst, and that he would discover her lewdness in the sight of her lovers, and destroy her vines and fig-trees, and make them a forest. So the prophet goes on terribly threatening her to the end of the thirteenth verse. And those things were fulfilled in the captivity of Israel in the land of Assyria. But in the verse preceding the text, and in the remainder of the chapter, there follows a gracious promise of mercy, which God would show her in the days of the gospel. "Therefore, behold I will allure her, and bring her into the wilderness, and speak comfortably unto her. And I will give her her vineyards from thence, and the valley of Achor for a door of hope; and she shall sing there, as in the days of her youth, and as in the day when she came up out of the land of Egypt." "I will allure her," that is, I will court or woo her again, as a young man woos a virgin, whom he desires to make his wife. God, for her committing adultery with other lovers, had threatened that he would give her a bill of divorce, as verse second. "Plead with your mother, plead; for she is not my wife, neither am I her husband." But here in the latter part of the chapter, God promises that in gospel times he would make her his wife again, as in the sixteenth verse. "And it shall be at that day that

And so in

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thou shalt call me Ishi;" that is, "my husband." verses 19, 20. "And I will betroth thee unto me for ever; yea, I will betroth thee unto me for ever in righteousness, and in judg ment, in loving kindness, and in mercies; I will even betroth thee unto me in faithfulness." Here in the fourteenth verse, God mises that he will woo her, and in the latter part of the verse, he shows in what manner he will deal with her when he is about to woo or allure her. He would first bring her into the wilderness; that is, he would bring her into trouble and distress, and so humble her, and then allure her by speaking comfortably or pleasantly to her, as a young man does to a maid whom he woos. Then follow

the words of the text.

1. We may observe what God would give to the children of Israel; viz. hope and comfort. He promises to give her vineyards; which being spiritually interpreted as most of the prophecies of gospel times are to be interpreted, signifies spiritual comforts. Vineyards afford wine, which is comfort to those who are of heavy hearts. Proverbs xxxi. 6. "Give wine to those that are of heavy hearts. Wine is to make glad the heart of man.' Psalms civ. 15. Gospel rest and peace are sometimes prophesied of, under the metaphor of every man's sitting under his vine and under his own fig-tree. God promises to give her hope, to open a door of hope for her, and to give her songs; that is, to give her spiritual joy, and both cause and disposition joyfully to sing praises to God.

2. We may observe after what manner God would bestow those benefits. 1. They should be given after great trouble and abasement. Before she had this hope and comfort given, she should be brought into great trouble and distress to humble her. He promises to give her her vineyards from thence; that is, from the wilderness spoken of in the foregoing verse, into which it is said that God would bring her, before he spoke comfortably to her. God would bring her into the wilderness, and then give her vineyards. God's bringing her into the wilderness was to humble hér, and fit her to receive vineyards, and to make her see her dependence on God for them, that she might not attribute her enjoyment of them to her idols, as she had done before, for which reason God took them away, as in the twelfth verse. "And I will destroy her vines and her fig-trees, whereof she hath said, these are my rewards that my lovers have given me; and I will make them a forest." There it is threatened that God will turn her vineyards into a forest, or wilderness. Here it is promised that he would turn the wilderness into vineyards, as Isaiah xxxii. 15. "Until the Spirit be poured on us from on high, and the wilderness be a fruitful field, and the fruitful field be counted for a forest." She should first be in a wilderness, where she shall see that she cannot help

herself, nor any of her idols help, or give her any vineyards. And then God will help her, that she shall see that it is God, and not any of her idols or lovers. God would first bring her into a wilderness, and thence give her vineyards, as God first brought the children of Israel into a dreadful wilderness. So God opened a door of hope to them in the valley of Achor, which is a word that signifies trouble, and was so called from the trouble which the children of Israel suffered by the sin of Achor. So God is wont first to make their sin a great trouble to them, an occasion of a great deal of distress, before he opens a door of hope. God promises to make her sing there as in the days of her youth, and as in the day when she came up out of the land of Egypt. This plainly refers to the joyful song which Moses and the children of Israel sang when they came up out of the Red Sea. The children of Israel there had great joy and comfort; but just before they had great trouble. They had been in extreme distress by the oppression of their task-masters; and just before this triumphant song, they were brought to extremity and almost to despair, when Pharaoh and the Egyptians appeared ready to swallow them up.

2. This hope and comfort should be bestowed on the slaying and forsaking of sin. That is the troubler of the soul. It should be given in the valley of Achor, which was the valley where the troubler of Israel was slain, as you may see in Joshua vii. 26; and the place where the children of Israel sang, when they came up out of the land of Egypt. The eastern shore of the Red Sea was the place where they saw their enemies and old task-masters, the types of men's lusts, which are sinners' taskmasters, lie dead on the sea shore, and of whom they took their final leave. And God had told them, that their enemies whom they had seen that day, they should see no more for ever.

Doctrine. God is wont to cause hope and comfort to arise in the soul after trouble and humbling for sin, and according as the troubler is slain and forsaken. I would show,

I. That it is thus with respect to the first true hope and comfort which is given to the soul at conversion.

II. That God is wont to bestow hope and comfort on Christians from time to time in this way.

I. God is wont to cause hope and comfort to arise to the soul in conversion after trouble and humbling for sin, and upon the slaying of the troubler.

1. It is God's manner to bestow hope and comfort on a soul in conversion after trouble and humbling for sin. Under this head are three things to be observed. 1. The trouble itself. 2. The cause, viz. sin. 3. The humbling.

1. Souls are wont to be brought into trouble before God bestows true hope and comfort. The corrupt hearts of men naturally incline