to your most important business and interests, which are of no consequence in comparison with this "one "thing needful." Arise then, and be doing, and the Lord will both assist and prosper your endea

Yours.

PART IV.

THE PROPER SEASONS FOR REPENTANCE.

SUCH persons as are but superficially acquainted with the credulity of man, and the artifice of Satan; as have taken but little notice of the workings of their own hearts, and made but little observation of what passes around them, may be apt to conclude this part of our subject needless: yet, I trust, it will be found to be of great importance, and essentially necessary, to a discourse concerning the proper seasons for repentance.

The words of the Psalmist, quoted by the Apostle, comprise what I shall urge on this head; "To-day, "if

if ye will hear his voice, harden not your heart." The present time alone is our's: yesterday is irrecoverably gone; to-morrow we may be in eternity! Were then all of you in the prime of youth, I would endeavour to enforce on all, the necessity of early repentance.

To such then I first address myself. Consider, young sinner, that custom is a second nature: thy innate depravity forges the chains which hold thee

and less inclination or resolution to encounter them. Fear, shame, and conscience will make gradually more feeble resistance; restraints of education will wear off, and you will grow bolder in iniquity. Finding respite from punishment, you will grow more secure and hardened in sin, till perhaps God will give you over to incurable obstinacy.

Do you imagine that sinful pleasures can afford you more satisfaction, than is to be found in serious godliness? Poor deluded souls, I compassionate your case, whilst I abhor the blasphemous supposition. Once I thought the same; I bless God for undeceiving me, and beg of him to grant you the same mercy. There is no peace, saith my God, for the wicked." Vanity and vexation," are stamped upon all created enjoyments. They consist of eager expectations; continual anxiety, disappointments, and mortifications; a few turbulent short-lived gratifications, insipid amusements, and fatiguing pursuits of pleasure. The mind of the poor deluded man, who thus seeks happiness where it is not, is uneasy in waiting for the season of enjoyment; surfeited and dissatisfied even at the moment he longed for; pained at the retrospect; alarmed when he looks forward to death and judgment; and he can find no respite from anxiety, but by banishing reflection, and foregoing the noblest privilege of the rational nature.Your smiles, ye votaries of pleasure, are hypocritical; your mirth affectation; your heart is heaviness in the midst of your loudest peals of laughter : remorse of conscience and foreboding fears often disturb even your most jovial hours, and extort the unwilling sigh; but they render solitude and reflec

to face the scorn and bear the reproach, of those comrades in iniquity, with whom you are hitherto happily unconnected: whilst perhaps your own children trained up in wickedness, or the wife or husband of your bosom, whom you have ignorantly espoused, may be among the number of those, who are an offence unto you. Are you, therefore, in youth, in early youth, yea, in childhood? you are not too young to be sinners, both by nature and practice: evil dispositions and evil actions, render repentance both needful and reasonable; and without it you must perish in your sins. Even now, therefore, I call upon you in the name of God, to

repent, and turn to God, and do works meet for "repentance." Listen not to your corruptions, to your companions, to the cruel murderer of souls, who would persuade you that it is soon enough yet. -Millions are now in outer darkness, who on earth, intended sometime to repent, but imagined they had time enough before them. Perhaps there are scarcely any, who did not once think as you are now thinking, and flatter themselves as you do. Will you also trifle with the Almighty, till his patience be wearied out, and he cut you off, as he hath those who thus provoked him before you; and send you to be their companions whose example you would imitate*?

Do you imagine you shall find less difficulty, or have more resolution to break through difficulties, hereafter? Alas! your difficulties will daily both be multiplied and gather force; and you will find less

* Jer. xiii. 27.-Wo unto thee, O Jerusalem, WILT thou not be Je clean? When shall it once be?

and less inclination or resolution to encounter them. Fear, shame, and conscience will make gradually more feeble resistance; restraints of education will wear off, and you will grow bolder in iniquity. Finding respite from punishment, you will grow more secure and hardened in sin, till perhaps God will give you over to incurable obstinacy.

Do you imagine that sinful pleasures can afford you more satisfaction, than is to be found in serious godliness? Poor deluded souls, I compassionate your case, whilst I abhor the blasphemous supposition. Once I thought the same; I bless God for undeceiving me, and beg of him to grant you the same mercy. There is no peace, saith my God, for the wicked." * Vanity and vexation," are stamped upon all created enjoyments. They consist of eager expectations; continual anxiety, disappointments, and mortifications; a few turbulent short-lived gratifications, insipid amusements, and fatiguing pursuits of pleasure. The mind of the poor deluded man, who thus seeks happiness where it is not, is uneasy in waiting for the season of enjoyment; surfeited and dissatisfied even at the moment he longed for; pained at the retrospect; alarmed when he looks forward to death and judgment; and he can find no respite from anxiety, but by banishing reflection, and foregoing the noblest privilege of the rational nature.Your smiles, ye votaries of pleasure, are hypocritical; your mirth affectation; your heart is heaviness in the midst of your loudest peals of laughter: remorse of conscience and foreboding fears often disturb even your most jovial hours, and extort the unwilling sigh; but they render solitude and reflec