Duty, a Delight. He who loves God, will certainly obey him; and he that does not love him, never can truly obey him as he ought, but will be ever repining at his Duty, and will be for feeking all pretences to excufe himself from it. He who doth not love his Neighbour, will be for taking all opportunities of purfuing his own advantage against him; but he who loves him as himself, will never do him any injury: He that loveth another, hath fulfilled the law: For this, thou shalt not commit adultery, thou shalt not kill, thou fhalt not fteal, thou shalt not bear falfe witness, thou shalt not covet; and if there be any other commandment, it is briefly comprehended in this faying, namely, Thou fbalt love thy neighbour as thy felf. Love worketh no ill to his neighbour, therefore love is the fulfilling of the law, Rom. xiii. 8. The Love of God,and of our Neighbour, comprehends the whole Duty of Man; which is a Doarine no where to be met withal, but in the Holy Scriptures: All the Wisdom of Philofophers could never difcover this Doctrine, which fets before us the only infallible Principles of Obedience. And it must be a moft gracious and wife Law, which makes Love the Principle and Foundation of our whole Duty both towards God and Man; and has ordained this, as the only fit means to qualifie and prepare us for the Fruition of God himself, and of one another, in Hea yen, to all Eternity.

III. The Christian Religion propofeth the most effectual motives to Obedience and Holinefs of Life. The moral Reasons and Arguments for a vertuous Life are fo great and evident, that those who live otherwife, are generally convinced that they ought not to do it: But because the Arguments from Reafon are too faint and lifeless, to oppose to Sense and Paffion; therefore the Chriftian Religion is purposely fitted to every Faculty, and prefents us with greater Objects of Fear, and Love, and Defire, than any thing in the World can do. And as God will be fer

ved by us, upon no other Princple but that of Love; fo the chiefeft Motive to our Obedience, express'd throughout the Scriptures, is the Divine Love. They reprefent to us all the methods which God has been pleafed to use, as neceffary to reclaim the World by his Mercies and his Judgments, by fending his Prophets at fundry times, and in divers manners, and at laft, by fending his own Son. He faw the fondness that Men have for this World, and for the Pleasures and Sins of it; how fubject they are to Temptations, and how prone to comply with them; and therefore he has been pleased to purfue us with the endearments of his Love, and with fuch condefcenfions of Grace and Favour, as muft needs mightily affect the most obftinate Sinner, who has but the fenfe and gratitude of a Man left in him to confider them; and then he has denounced his Wrath and Vengeance against all fuch, as will not be led and perfuaded to their own Happiness, by the infinite Love of Chrift. He was born, he lived, he died for us; he has procured our Pardon, he proffers us his Grace and Affiftance, he promises us eternal Happinefs with him felf in Heaven, upon our Obedience; and laft of all, he threatens us with eternal Mifery, if we will not be Happy; thus forcing us, as it were, to Happinefs, if we will not be perfuaded to it; for this is all the force that free Agents are capable of. And if all that infinite Love could do to excite our Love, if all the Rewards that infinite Mercy and Goodness could propofe, and the feverest Punishments that Almighty Vengeance can inflict, will not prevail with Men to follow Vertue, and refrain from Vice, nothing can poffibly prevail with them. Love is moft apt to produce Love, and hopes of Reward have a mighty effect upon Men of any good Temper and Difpofition; but the fears' of Punishment are wont to work upon the very worst Men: And where infinite Loving-kindness, eternal Rewards, and eternal Punishments, do all concur to

bring Men to the practice of Vertue, no motive can be wanting, by which human Nature is capable of being wrought upon.

IV. The Chriftian Religion affords the greatest Helps and Affiftances to an holy Life. The Devil and his Angels are not more maliciously watchful and diligent with their Affaults and Temptations, to contrive and promote our Destruction, than the good Angels are careful and active to protect us against their Attempts, and fecure our Salvation; which they are concerned, and employed to do, by God's exprefs Commiffion and Appointment: Are they not all miniftring Spirits, fent forth to minifter for them who shall be heirs of falvation? Heb. i. 14. And God himself, who is a Spirit, and is the Author of the Being, and of the Life and Motion of all things, doth more-efpecially act upon the Spirits and Minds of Men, by putting into them good Defires, and by inclining their Hearts to keep his Commandments, and perform his Will. This Grace and Favour of God towards us, this spiritual Aid and Strength, is fufficient to enable us to conquer Sin, and overcome Temptations. And we are exhorted to come boldly to the throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy, and find grace to help in time of need, Hebr. iv. 16. which we are affured fhall be beftowed upon us for Chrift's fake, through his Merits, and by virtue of his Mediation and Interceffion. All the World has been fenfible of the great proneness in Human Nature to Evil, and backwardness to what Reason it felf feems to dictate as good and fit to be done; but the Chriftian Religion only has provided a Remedy to cure this great Corruption of our Nature, and affift us in the performance of our Duty.

V. The Chriftian Religion expreffeth the greatest compaffion and condefcenfion to our Infirmities. Chrift died to make Satisfaction for our Sins, and to procure acceptance with God for us, upon our Repen

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tance; he intercedes for us, and pleads the Merits of his own Death and Paffion in our behalf; we have an Advocate with the Father, Jefus Chrift the righteous, and he is the Propitiation for our fins, though they be never fo great and heinous, if we do but truly repent of them, and forfake them. And the Sins of Ignorance, and Surprize, and Infirmity, are not inconfiftent with the terms of Salvation; but a general Humiliation and Repentance, with a conftant and fincere endeavour to ferve and pleafe God, will, through Christs Merits, be accepted of by him; for fuch Sins as we have no fufficient means or ability of knowing to be Sins, and for fuch as by reafon of the frailty of our Nature, we cannot live wholly free from, nothing is required of us, but a fincere and honeft Diligence to do what we can, and a lively Faith to rely upon Christ's Merits, for the pardon of what Sins we are not able wholly to avoid.

Men are forward to complain of the Uneafiness of the Chriftian Yoke, without any true experience and trial of it, and without confidering the Principles, and Motives, and Helps, and the condescending and gracious Terms which the Gofpel propofes. Indeed, to lay fome Injunctions and Restraints more than are abfolutely neceffary, is but what all Law-givers have done. For fome things are to be forbidden, as a prevention and a prefervative from the commiffion of Sin, and others commanded as preparatory qualifications and difpofitions to Vertue, and to make the practice of it more eafie and certain to us. And if Men are allowed in all Governments to have this Authority, certainly God, who has an abfolute Power over us, and perfectly knows what is neceflary for our good, and for the ends of his Government, and has promised Rewards to the Obedient, infinitely greater than any that human Law-givers can propofe; has an undeniable Right to forbid or command us fome things, which by the Law of Nature we might have

'been

been allowed or excufed from. But these are very few, and all things confidered, no Religion ever was fo compaffionate and eafie as the Chriftian Religion.

VI. The Propagation of the Gospel has ever had great effects towards the Reformation and Happiness of Mankind. What could be more beneficial to the World, and more for the Peace and Happiness of all Mankind, than to be taught to live under a perpetual fense and awe of the Love and Fear of God, and to be constrained to perform our feveral Duties to each other, in our respective Capacities and Relations, with the utmoft Fidelity and Integrity; and to have this enforced upon the Confciences of Men by the Hopes and Terrors of a future Judgment, and an eternal State of Happiness or Mifery, as they fhall prove obedient, or disobedient? Thefe then must be acknowledg'd to be Doctrines most worthy of God, and the proper Subject of a Revelation. For however Men may wifh, as to themselves in particular, that they had not been abridg'd their finful Pleasures, yet in respect to the common Good of Society, it must needs be confefs'd by the most inveterate Enemies of Christianity, and by those who will believe nothing of another Life, that if the Chriftian Religion were as generally practis'd, as it is profefs'd, it would make Mankind as happy as it is poffible for Men to be in this Life, through the Belief and Expectation of a Life to come. And as much as the Practice of the Chriftian Religion has been neglected, it is fo far from being a fpeculative Notion only, that it has a real and perpetual Influence for the Good of the World, even in the worst and molt degenerate Ages.

We are not, at this distance of time, easily made fenfible, how great Bleffings the Chriftian Religion brought to Mankind, in that Reformation which it foon introduc'd into the World. For upon their Converfion, there became fuch a visible Alteration in the Tempers and Lives of Men, that they feem'd to have

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