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SERMON III

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2 COR. viii. 9.

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For ye know the Grace of our Lord Jefus Chrift, that though he was rich yet for your Sakes he became poor, that ye through his Poverty might be rich.

T

HE Distance between God and
Man is fuch, that our blef-
fed Saviour might have been

faid to have impoverished himfelf at his Incarnation, though he had affumed our Nature with all the Circumftances of Advantage. Had his Conditi

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on been honourable and wealthy, and never fo well fortifyed and fupplyed; had he had all the innocent Satisfactions, that Power and Contrivance could furnish; yet in this Region of Mortality, we are encumbered with fo many unavoidable Difficulties, and carry fuch Marks of Weaknefs and Dependance about us; that as David obferves, Man at his best Estate is little less than altogether Vanity. We peed take but a fhort Survey of the several Stages of Life to demonstrate this Truth. Now how tender and imperfect are the Rudiments of our Being, how defenceless do we come into the World, and what a small stock of Strength and Understanding do we fet out with? How many Dangers are we fubject to in our Childhood; how contemptible are our Entertainments, and what a flavish and arbitrary Government are we fubject to? ́And though our want of Apprehenfion makes fome of thefe Inconveniences lefs troublesome to us now; yet if we had a double and diftinct Capacity, if we carry'd the Man and the Child about us at the fame

Time;

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Time; if we had one Soul, little more than a Blank without any Characters of Knowledge in it; and an other grown to its full Maturity in Judgment, and Experience; the Cafe would be very differént: For then the Folly, the Servitude and infecure Condition of the Infant Part would be exactly observed, which without Doubt would be no plea fant Speculation to the other; if we could criticise upon our felves in our Child-hood, if we could confider how flowly we emerge out of the State of a Brute, by what infenfible Degrees Understanding dawns upon us, and what little and laborious Steps we take towards Improvement; we fhould think we made but an odd Figure in the World. And to carry the Hint a little farther, fuppofing an Angel vitally united to one of us, when our Mind and Body were in the moft flourishing and best furnish'd Condition; when he found himself obliged to the continual Returns of Sleep, which are no less than so many Breaks, and Intervals in Life; when he was intimately fenfible how ma

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ny little Actions we do over again, and how trifling that Employment is which we call the Bufinefs of our Life: When he felt our eager Defires, our ama zing Fears, and all that Train of Paffions which follow from the Shortnefs and Obfcurity of our Reason, from our Want of Power, and from all those Accidents we are daily expofed to; if fuch an intelligent Spirit was' experimentally acquainted with thefe Things, we have Rea fon to believe he would be fomewhat weary of his Compofition, and endeavour to difentangle himself into his former Being. From all which it appears what a great Condefcenfion it was for the Word to be made Flesh; what an humble Habitation he was contented with, when he dwelt among us, and that humane Nature at its highest Exaltation here, can be but a mean Companion for a God. But our bleffed Saviour was not only pleased to ftoop to the Poverty of our Nature, but to the poorest Condition of that too: His firft Reception in the World was mean, his Birth reputedly obfcure, his

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