corruptible habit, and putting on robes of glory. Fall, fall ye imperfect senses, ye frail organs, fall house of clay into your original dust; you will be sown in corruption, but raised in incorruption ; sown in dishonor, but raised in glory ; sown in weakness, but raised in power, 1 Cor. xv. 42. If I consider my soul, it is passing, I see, from slavery to freedom. I shall carry with me that, which thinks and reflects. I shall carry with me the delicacy of taste, the harmony of sounds, the beauty of colors, the fragrance of odoriferous smells. I shall surmount heaven and earth, nature and all terrestrial things and my ideas of all their beauties will multiply and expand. If I consider the future economy, to which I go, I have, I own, very inadequate notions of it; but my incapacity is the ground of my expectation. Could I perfectly comprehend it, it would argue its resemblance to some of the present objects of my senses, or its minute proportion to the present operations of my mind. If worldly dignities and grandeurs, if accumulated treasures, if the enjoyments of the most refined voluptuousness, were to represent to me celestial felicity, I should suppose, that, partaking of their nature, they partook of their vanity. But, if nothing here can represent the future state, it is because that state surpasseth every other. My ardor is increased by my imperfect knowledge of it. My knowledge and virtue, I am certain, will be perfected; I know, I shall comprehend truth, and obey order; I know, I shall be free from all evils, and in possession of all good; I shall be present with God, I know, and with all the happy spirits, who surround his throne; and this perfect state, I am sure, will continue for ever and ever."

Such are the all-sufficient supports, which revealed religion affords against the fear of death. Such

are the meditations of a dying christian; not of one, whose whole christianity consists of dry speculations, which have no influence over his practice; but of one, who applies his knowledge to relieve the real wants of his life.

Christianity, then, we have seen, is superior to natural religion, in these four rsspects. To these we will add a few more reflections in further evidence of the superiority of revealed religion to the religion of nature.

1. The ideas of the ancient philosophers concerning natural religion were not collected into a body of doctrine. One philosopher had one idea, another studious man had another idea; ideas of truth and virtue, therefore, lay dispersed. Who doth not see the pre-eminence of revelation, on this article? No human capacity either hath been, or would ever have been equalled to the noble conception of a perfect body of truth. There is no genius so narrow as not to be capable of proposing some clear truth, some excellent maxim: But to lay down principles, and to perceive at once a chain of consequences, these are the efforts of great geniusses; this capability is philosophical perfection. If this axiom be incontestible, what a fountain of wisdom does the system of christianity argue? It presents us, in one lovely body of perfect symmetry, all the ideas we have enumerated. One idea supposeth another idea; and the whole is united in a manner so compact, that it is impossible to alter one particle without defacing the beauty of all.

2. Pagan philosophers never had a system of natural religion comparable with that of modern philosophers, although the latter glory in their contempt of revelation. Modern philosophers have derived the clearest and best parts of their systems from the very revelation, which they affect to des

pise. We grant, the doctrines of the perfections of God, of providence, and of a future state, are perfectly conformable to the light of reason. A man, who should pursue rational tracks of knowledge to his utmost power, would discover, we own, all these doctrines: But it is one thing to grant, that these doctrines are conformable to reason; and it is another to affirm, that reason actually discovered them. It is one thing to allow, that a man, who should pursue rational tracks of knowledge to his utmost power, would disover all these doctrines; and it is another to pretend, that any man hath pursued these tracks to the utmost, and hath actually discovered them. It was the gospel, that taught mankind the use of their reason. It was the gospel, that assisted men to form a body of natural religion. Modern philosophers avail themselves of these aids; they form a body of natural religion by the light of the gospel, aud then they attribute to their own penetration what they derive from foreign aid.

3. What was most rational in the natural religion of the Pagan philosophers was mixed with fancies and dreams. There was not a single philosopher, who did not adopt some absurdity, and communicate it to his disciples. One taught, that every being was animated with a particular soul, and on this absurd hypothesis he pretended to account for all the phænomena of nature. Another took every star for a god, and thought the soul a vapor, that passed from one body to another, expiating in the body of a beast the sins that were committed in that of a man. One attributed the creation of the world to a blind chance, and the government of all events in it to an inviolable fate. Another affirmed the eternity of the world, and said, there was no period in eternity, in which hea

ven and earth, nature and elements, were not visible. One said, Every thing is uncertain; we are not sure of our own existence; the distinction between just and unjust, virtue and vice, is fanciful, and hath no real foundation in the nature of things. Another made matter equal to God; and maintained, that it concurred with the supreme Being in the formation of the universe. One took the world. for a prodigious body, of which, he thought, God was the soul. Another affirmed the materiality of the soul, and attributed to matter the faculties of thinking and reasoning. Some denied the immortality of the soul, and the intervention of Providence; and pretended, that an infinite number of particles of matter, indivisible, and indestructible, revolved in the universe; that from their fortuitous concourse arose the present world; that in all this there was no design; that the feet were not formed for walking, the eyes for seeing, nor the hands for handling. The gospel is light without darkness. It hath nothing mean; nothing false; nothing that doth not bear the characters of that wisdom, from which it proceeds.

4. What was pure in the natural religion of the heathens was not known, nor could be known to any but philosophers. The common people were incapable of that penetration and labor, which the investigating of truth, and the distinguishing of it from that falshood, in which passion and prejudice had enveloped it, required. A mediocrity of genius, I allow, is sufficient for the purpose of inferring a part of those consequences from the works of nature, of which we form the body of natural religion: But none, but geniusses of the first order, are capable of kenning those distant consequences, which are infolded in darkness. The bulk of mankind wanted a short way proportional

to every mind. They wanted an authority, the infallibility of which all mankind might easily see. They wanted a revelation founded on evidence plain and obvious to all the world. Philosophers could not shew the world such a short way: but revelation hath shewn it. No philosopher could assume the authority necessary to establish such a way it became God alone to dictate in such a manner, and in revelation he hath done it.

Here we would finish this discourse; but, as the subject is liable to abuse, we think it necessary to guard you against two common abuses, and as the doctrine is reducible to practice, we will add two general reflections on the whole to direct your conduct.

1. Some, who acknowledge the superior excellence of revealed religion to the religion of nature, cast an odious contempt on the pains that are taken to cultivate reason, and to improve the mind. They think, the way to obtain a sound system of divinity is to neglect an exact method of reasoning; with them to be a bad philosopher is the ready way to become a good christian; and to cultivate reason is to render the design of religion abortive. Nothing can be more foreign from the intention of St. Paul, and the design of this discourse, than such an absurd consequence. Nothing would so effectually depreciate the gospel, and betray the, cause into the hands of atheists and infidels. On the contrary, an exact habit of reasoning is essential to a sound system of divinity; reason must be cultivated, if we would understand the excellent characters of religion; the better philosopher, the more disposed to become a good christian. Do not deceive yourselves, my brethren; without rational knowledge, and accurate judgment, the full evidence of the arguments, that