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proudly oppose the just claims of God to thy service and obedience. How canst thou avert the opprobrium of the basest insensibility and ingratitude, while the most affecting display of the mercies of God, and of the exalted riches of his love towards thee in Jesus Christ, cannot induce thee to relinquish the sins, which are daily abusing his mercy and contemning his love, which are daily renewing the pangs that rent the bosom of the Saviour, a victim for thy guilt, to the unsparing wrath of heaven. Ah! my soul! while sin reigns in thy affections; while wilful violations of the laws of God defile thy conscience; though thy pretended sorrow should burst forth in loud, and ardent, and reiterated confessions and supplications, thou art still obnoxious to the wrath of God-still the slave of degrading, corrupting, and disappointing pleasures-still exposed to the pangs of anxiety, apprehension, and remorse thou art still the presumptuous rebel against the authority of God, still the guilty and hardened contemner of his love.

There is no way in which thou canst prove that thy repentance is genuine-no way in which thou canst obtain a title to the love and favour of God-no way in which thou canst prepare for being a worthy and accepted guest at the table of the Lord, but, by earnest and uniform desire to be delivered from the dominion of sin, by sincere and ardent vows of obedience to thy God and Saviour.

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Let then thy desires to be delivered from the dominion of sin, and thy vows of duty and obedience, be sincere and lively.

If, in proportion to the disgrace, the infamy, and misery of the calamities that oppress us, should be the sincerity and warmth of our desires to be delivered from them;deliverance from the degrading and miserable bondage of sin should awaken the most sincere and lively desires of our hearts. If, in proportion to the magnitude of the favours we have received from a benefactor, and the value of the blessings which he has still in store for us, should be the sincerity and ardor of our devotion to him;-the vows of obedience to our heavenly Father and Redeemer, who is the source of all our blessings, and the only stay of all our hopes, should awaken and engage the highest fervour of our affections. From a degrading dominion, that corrupts and blasts our purity and peace, we seek to be delivered. To a merciful and gracious God, who is worthy our highest homage, and who claims our most ardent gratitude, we are to vow allegiance. The most splendid and exalted object of worldly desire and pursuit, sinks, in the comparison with the sublime and momentous concerns of our eternal destiny. Desires and resolutions, if possible, infinitely more ardent than those which carry us impetuously forward in the chace of worldly enjoyments,

should be devoted to the attainment of that spiritual redemption, of that sacred fidelity and zeal in the service of God, which are the only pledges of our present and eternal peace. Thy desires and resolutions, O my soul, are to be offered up to a holy God, who searches the heart; who, jealous of his honor, and the sacred claims of his authority, will- indignantly resent and punish the hypocritical and superficial professions of love and obedience, Thinkest thou, he will behold thee panting with eager desire in the pursuit of worldly pleasure, vowing, with, supreme ardor of affection, devotion to the idols of honor and wealth; and, when to him, thy most sincere love, thy most zealous and active obedience are due, be himself content with the empty and feeble homage of affections which are wasting, their most exalted and generous feryours, on debasing and transitory gratifications! View, the unexampled prodigies of divine love, in the sufferings and death commemorated on the altar. Contemplate the rich, the refreshing, the invigorating, the immortal blessings of that spiritual banquet which a merciful Redeemer hath graciously provided. Redemption from sin and its convulsive pangs, restoration to the favour of God and the never-failing consolations of his love, purity of heart and the inexpressible peace which is always its blest attendant, communion with God and the divine and unutterable

pleasures which he pours upon the soul, a lively foretaste, of the ineffable joys of heaven, that bears the sublimed affections, on the wings of sacred rapture, to the eternal source of glory and bliss,-these are the rich and exalted blessings, which, in the spiritual banquet of his body and blood, the love of thy Saviour hath prepared for thee. Impenetrable and hardened art thou, if blessings thus exalted do not excite thy supreme and most ardent desires;-lost to every amiable feeling, and deserving of the indignant curse of heaven, if, at the very moment when thy Saviour displays the awful depths of his sufferings, and offers thee the rich and eternal blessings which were purchased by them, thou canst repay his unutterable love with feeble, superficial, hypocritical vows of duty.

It is not enough that thy desires and resolutions be lively and sincere; they must be uniform and universal.

Those desires and resolutions cannot be sincere, which, while they urge us to make partial sacrifices to the laws of God, still seek to retain some particular favourite gratifications. Those desires and resolutions cannot be sincere, which are capricious and irregular, and which are only occasionally and rarely exerted. The ardors of holy desire and resolution should glow, with steady and uniform fervor. No temptations, however seducing, should damp or quench them; no duties, how

ever difficult or arduous, should dismay or arrest them. The true penitent, who is awakened to a due sense of the immense debt of gratitude, which he owes to his Almighty Father and Redeemer, will not measure his obedience, by the nice calculations of cold and selfish policy. His vows of duty will burst forth, from the lively emotions of a heart beating high with grateful love. His vows of obedience will embrace all the sacrifices, to which, devotion to his blessed Lord may call him. They will extend to all the various and most exalted acts of duty, by which he may advance the glory and honour of his Redeemer and God, and prove himself worthy of their applauding fiat.

For an entire deliverance from the corrupting dominion of sinful passions, and for a restoration to the holy and celestial image of thy maker, let then thy most ardent, desires, O my soul, be uniformly exerted. Offer not to God resolutions of duty, the sudden fruit of transitory glows of feeling. Be thy vows of allegiance founded, on a deep and serious conviction, of the weighty obligations that should bind thee to him, of the exalted and ennobling nature of his service, of its brilliant and glorious rewards.. Except not, from thy vows of obedience, any hallowed precept of thy Saviour, though it may require thee to crush the indulgence to which, thou dost cling, with supreme ardour of affection. Resolve on that

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