than he followed Christ : and whereinsoever they deviate from the path marked out for them by Almighty God, there we must choose the more perfect way, and adhere exclusively to that which unerring wisdom has prescribed to us, knowing no other rule than that of God's commands.
Doubtless in dubious matters we would recommend much deliberation, and diffidence, and circumspection. We would not have young people setting up their judgment hastily against that of their superiors in age and station : for the young and inexperienced are apt to see things in a very partial light, and not to take a sufficiently comprehensive view of any subject; and hence they often err, when in their own judgment they are most confident that they are acting right. But still the word of God must be your rule : you must try every thing by that standard : if what you see, or what is recommended to you, be evidently contrary to that, you must not do it, though it be sanctioned by the authority of the whole world : nor, if a line of conduct be clearly and undoubtedly agreeable to that, must you be diverted from it even though the whole world rose up to oppose you. It is by the word of God that you will be judged in the last day ; and therefore by that, and that only, must you be regulated now.]
This salutary caution is further confirmed by, III. A convincing appeal —
" Your fathers, where are they ? and the prophets, do they live for ever ?" No : both the one and the other are gone to give up their account to God, and to receive from him their proper doom. Now, what- ever they may have thought or done, they know that God's word is true, and that it shall stand for ever. But to a certain degree this may be seen even in this world.
Has not the word of God taken hold of multitudes who have gone before us ?
[Look at the Antediluvian world : were not God's threat- enings verified in them ? Look at the Jews at the time of the Babylonish captivity : did the word of God fail with respect to them ? They put to death their prophets for predicting that captivity ; but were the predictions falsified ? Were the Jews able to avert, or to escape, the judgments that had been de- nounced ? Look at the Jews at this present time, and com- pare their state with all the prophecies concerning them, from the time of Moses to that of Christ and his Apostles : has one word fallen to the ground ? Has not the word of God found