and impious discourse be suppressed ? Would not sin of every kind receive a salutary check? Would not many of the diseases, the troubles, the feuds, and the miseries that result from sin, be prevented ? Would not many of the judgments of God which now desolate the earth, the wars, the famines, the pestilences, be removed"? Would not, in numberless instances, knowledge be diffused, consolation administered, and virtue called forth into act and exercise ? Would not our children, as they grow up, reap the benefit of such examples0? Let any one judge impartially, and say, whether a due regard to the Scriptures would not greatly meliorate the state of society, and of every individual, in proportion as Ins fife was conformed to themp?]
2. It will secure an inheritance beyond the grave —
[The earthly Canaan was typical of heaven ; when there- fore we see the possession of that good land promised to the Jews, we must, in applying the promises to ourselves, raise our views to the Canaan that is above. Now what are the means which God has prescribed for the securing of that glorious in- heritance ? Certainly an attention to the Scriptures is that one mean, without which we never can attain to happiness, and in the use of which we cannot but attain it. It is by the Scrip- tures that God quickens us q, and brings us first into Ins family1". It is by them that he directs our ways, and keeps our feet1, and sanctifies our hearts u, and makes us wise unto salvation x, and gives us a very " heaven upon earth."
And shall not the hope of such benefits allure us ? When we have eternal life in the Scriptures, shall we not search themy, yea, and meditate upon them day and night2 ? Let then the word be sweeter to us than honey or the honey-comb a, and be esteemed by us more than our necessary foodb.]c
n ver. 13 — 17. ° Prov. xxii. 6. p Ps. xix. 11.
i Ps. xix. 7, 8. and cxix. 50.
r Jam. i. 18. 1 Pet. i. 23. See also Acts viii. 28 — 39.
s Ps. cxix. 105. * Ps. cxix. 9, 11. and xxxvii. 31.
u Eph. v. 26. x 2 Tim. iii. 15. y John v. 39.
2 Ps. i. 2. a Ps. xix. 10. b Job xxiii. 12.
0 If this were the subject of a Sermon for Sunday Schools, or Charity Schools, or the distribution of Bibles and religious tracts, an Application, suited to the occasion, should be added.