language of the heart, as if it had been manifested by ten thousand acts. Let this be duly considered. We may deceive others, and we may deceive ourselves : but we cannot deceive our God; for " he knows the things that come into our mind, every one of them."]
2. That however innocent they may suppose their state to be, God will punish it —
[God cannot look upon persons of this description with- out the deepest resentment : for they place him on a level with the basest idol, whose proper character is, that " it can do neither good nor evilf." And how can a holy and jealous God endure this ? Be it so : their wickedness is only, as it were, of a negative kind ; and consists rather in a neglect of what is good, than in a perpetration of what is evil : but was this unpunished in the antediluvian world? " They ate, they drank; they planted, they builded; they married, and were given in marriage :" and, What harm, it may be asked, was there in all this ? None : but the evil was, that they lived without any regard for God : and therefore God sent a deluge, and swept them all away. And so will he do with respect to those who now cast off all fear of him, and, in heart at least, banish him from the world which he has created. See in what light he views such conduct : he declares " the iniquity of it to be exceeding great g;" and denounces against it his heaviest indignation11. And so far are these persons from being out of danger, that the more secure they apprehend themselves to be, the greater and more imminent their danger is. They may say, Peace and safety; but "sudden destruction will come upon them, as travail upon a woman with child, and they shall not escape1:" they may sleep ; but " their judgment lingereth not, and their damnation slumbereth not." " The sins of some are open beforehand, going before to judgment : but they that are otherwise cannot be hidk." It is in vain to say that they do no harm : for the unprofitable servant, no less than the openly wicked, shall be " cast into outer darkness, where is weeping, and wailing, and gnashing of teeth."]
Address —
1. Those who are living in the state above described —
[I will appeal to you yourselves respecting the wickedness of your lives. Judge ye between God and your own souls. Consider yourselves but as creatures ; and does it become you to live without any regard for your Creator? But view your-
f Jer. x. 5. e Ezek. ix. 9. h Deut. xxix. 19, 20.
1 1 Thess. v. 3. K 1 Tim. v. 24, 25.