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fend them away with a depart ye Curfed who send away their afflicted Brethren, naked and destitute, abandoning fhall I fay or condemning them to lafting milery, with a scornful look and relentless heart: Ah! may God of his infinite Mercy deliver every one that hears me this day from this Guilt and from this Sentence.

The

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The Fifth Sermon.

HEBR. xii. 1.

Wherefore, feeing we alfo are compassed about with fo great a Cloud of Witnesses, let us lay afide every weight, and the fin which doth fo easily befet us, and let us run with patience the Race that is fet before us.

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O confront Atheism with the Resurrection of Jefus, and Immorality with the Lives of Saints, demonstrating the Power of God in the one, and of Faith in the other, is a way of arguing, which if it do not Reclaim the Infidel and Sinner, if it do not utterly filence the Objects of the one against the Truth, and of the other against the Poffibility of Religion, must yet needs ruffle and disturb the Confcience of both, and fill it with an uneafie Shame and Fear; but how much more must this way of Reasoning prevail where ever there are any Principles of Natural Religion, or any Seeds of Ingenui

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ty and Probity; where-ever there is but a Form of Godliness or the leaft Difpofition to the Power of it. This is the Method the Apostle here obferves; he demonftrates the Force and Virtue of Faith by the infuperable Courage and Patienceof fuchin all Ages as were acted and fupported by it: And thenwell knowing,that the Belief of another Life was established upon a brighter Revelation and fuller Evidence than God had ever yet vouchsafed the World, addreffing himself to Chriftians, as Men who would be ashamed to be out-done by Jew or Gentile, or fhrink at fuch Tryals as they had triumphed over, he concludes in the words of my Text, Wherefore, feeing we alfo are compaffed about with fo greata Cloud of Witnesses, &c.

These words contain three Parts:
I. A Duty.

II. Directions for the fucceßful dif

charge of it. III.

Motives and Inforcements to it.

The Duty is, To run the Race that is fet before us.

The Direction confifts of Three Rules: 1. That we must lay afide every weight; but especially, 2ly, The fin that doth fo

eafily befet us. 3ly, That we must run with patience.

The Motives and Inforcements are partly expreffed in thefe words, Seeing we are compaffed about with fuch a Cloud of Witnesses; partly implied and involved in the Metaphorical Description of our Duty, The Race that is fet before us; for this intimates a Crown to be the Reward of him, who fo runs as to obtain.

First of the Duty: The Race of the Primitive Chriftians confifted especially in the Propagating the Kingdom of Jefus, and fecuring their own by fufferings and Blood. And that this is the Race my Text immediately relates to, is plain; it being nothing else but an Exhortation founded on the Tryals and Tortures in the former Chapter, and reinforced by the Example of Jefus in this, Who for the Joy that was fet before him, indured the Cross, and defpifed the Shame. But if we take this Exhortation in the utmost latitude we may, and fuppofe it address'd to all Chriftians in general, then our Race will confift in doing the good which God hath appointed us, and especially in furmounting whatever difficulty or oppofition we may encounter in the purfuit of it.

1. In doing Good: The great defign of Christianity is to multiply our Obligations and Incouragements, and to raile and inlarge our Capacities of doing good. The Holy Scripture was infpired and written that the Man of God might be perfect, throughly furnished to every good work, and the Holy Spirit is communicated, to relieve the Weakneffes and Indifpofitions of our Natures, and inable us to act the great things which that prescribes. Illumination fills the Mind of Man with a juft comprehenfion of the Dignity of his Nature, and the great ends of his Creation. Purification fets him at Liberty to pursue them, and fires the Heart with a holy Ardour and Zeal to do fo: And Faith ftrengthens and fortifies him against the contradiction of Sinners and Temptations of the Body. Doing good then is undoubtedly that wherein the Chriftian Race confifts. But it must be

2ly, That Good which God hath appointed us. We must neither contract nor inlarge the Notion of doing good beyond those Bounds which God hath fet us. We must not inlarge it, by placing Religion in thofe Works which Prejudice or Prepoffeffion, Fancy or Faction

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