lemnly charges us to oppofe corrupt nature with the utmost resolution, left we be cast into hell, where the worm dieth not and the fire is not quenched. Mark ix. 43. With tendernefs he informs us, that whofoever shall fay to his brother, Thou fool fhall be in danger of hell fire; that not only the wicked, but the unprofitable fervant shall be caft into outer darkness, where will be weeping, wailing, and gnashing of teeth: and that he himfelf, far from conniving at fin, will fix the doom of all impenitent finners, by this dreadful fentence, Depart from me ye curfed into everlasting fire, prepared for the Devil and his angels. Matt. v. 22. and xxv. 30. 41.

JI. I flatter my felf that the doctrine, which we are to try by the touch-flone of Reason, has been already fufficiently established from fcripture. Nevertheless, that the Reader may have the fulleft view of fo momentous a fubject, I shall yet prefent him with a recapitulation of the whole, in the words of our pious Reformers, taken out of the Articles, Homilies, and Liturgy of the Church of England.

The 9th Article thus defcribes our depravity and danger. Original, or birth-fin is the fault, and corruption of the nature of every man, that naturally is engendered of the offspring of Adam whereby man is very far gone from original righteoufnefs and is of his own nature inclined to evil, fo that

the

the flesh lufteth always contrary to the Spirit; and therefore in every perfon born into this world, it deferveth God's wrath and damnation.

The 35th Article gives fanction to the Homi lies in the following words: The book of Homilies contains a good and wholefome doctrine, and therefore we judge them to be read in Churches, by Minifters, diligently and diftinelly, that they may understood by the people. Let us then fee, how

be

they fet forth the good and wholesome, though lamentable and humbling doctrine of our loft estate;

The title of the 2d is, A Sermon of the mifery of mankind, and of his condemnation to death everlafting by his fin. In the close of it, the contents are fummed up in these words :: We have heard, how evil we are of ourselves; how of ourselves, and by ourselves, we have no goodness, help, or falvation: but on the contrary, fin, damnation, and death everlasting.

Our Church is uniform in her woeful accounts of man's mifery. Hear her in the 1ft Homily for Whitsunday: Man OF HIS OWN NATURE (fince the fall) is fleshly and carnal, corrupt and nought, finful and difobedient to God, without any park of goodness in him, without any virtuous or godly motion, only given to evil thoughts and wicked deeds.

In the Homily on the nativity fhe speaks thus: He (difobedient man) was now curfed and abhorred: inftead of the image of God,he was now become the image of the Devil the bond-flave of hell: altogether Spotted

Spotted and defiled, he feemed to be nothing else but a lump of fin; and therefore, by the just judgment of God he was condemned to everlasting death. Thus, in Adam, all men became univerfally mortal, having in themfelves nothing but everlasting dam

nation of body and foul.

The fame doctrine is delivered with the fame plainnefs in the fecond part of the Homily on the paffion. Adam died the death, that is, became mortal, loft the favour of God, and was caft out of paradife, being no longer a citizen of heaven, but a firebrand of hell, and a bond-flave of the devil. And St. Paul bears witness, that by Adam's offence death came upon all men to condemnation, who became plain reprobates and caftaways, being perpetually damned to the everlafling pains of hell-fire.

Agreeable to this we are taught, in the 2d part of the Homily on Repentance, that part of that virtue confifts in an unfeigned acknowledgement of our fins to God, whom, by them, we have fo griev ously offended, that if he should deal with us according

* Prejudiced perfons, who inftead of confidering the entire fyftem of truth, run away with a part detached from the whole, will be offended here, as if our Church "damned every body." But the candid Reader will eafily observe, that, instead of dooming any one to deftruction, fhe only declares, that the Saviour finds all men in a state of condem nation and mifery, where they would eternally remain, were it not for the compaffionate equity of our gracious God, which does not permit him to fentence to a consciousness of eternal torments, any one of his creatures, for a fin, of which they never were perfonally guilty; and of which, confequently, they can never have any consciousness.

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ing to his justice, we deferve a thousand hells, if there were fo many.

The fame vein of wholesome, though unpleasant doctrine runs through the Liturgy of our Church. She opens her service by exhorting us not to dif femble, nor cloak our manifold fins and wickedness. She acknowledges in her confeffions, that we have erred and frayed from God's ways like loft sheep, that there is no health in us,-that we are miferable finners, miferable offenders, to whom our fins are grievous, and the burden of them is intolerable.

She begins her baptifmal office by reminding us, that all men are conceived and born in fin. She teaches in her catechifm, that we are by nature' born in fin, and the children of wrath. She confeffes in the collect before the general thanksgiving, that we are tied and bound with the chain of our fins, and intreats God to let the pitifulness of his great mercy loofe us: and in her suffrages she befeeches him to have mercy upon us, to spare us, and make fpeed to fave us; a language that can fuit none but condemned finners.

Duly fenfible of our extreme danger till we have fecured an interest in Chrift, at the grave The fupplicates the most holy God, not to deliver us into the bitter pains of eternal death; and in the litany fhe befeeches our Lord Jefus Chrift, ly his agony and bloody fweat, by his cross and paffion to deliver us from his wrath and everlasting damnation. Thus is our Church every where confiftent with herself, and with the oracles of God,

in

in representing us as corrupt, condemned creatures, in Adam; till we are penitent, abfolved believers in Jefus Chrift.

The doctrine to be demonftrated in this Treatife being thus fully ftated, in the confentaneous words of the facred Writers, and our pious Reformers, I fhall close this Part by an appeal to the Reader's candor and common sense. If fuch are the fentiments of our Church, are those church-men reafonable, who intimate, that all the maintainers of them, are either her open or fecret enemies? And may they rank with modeft, hum-' ble Chriftians, who inftead of the self-abafing scripture-doctrine here laid down, boldly substitute pompous, pharifaic descriptions of the prefent dignity and rectitude of human nature ?-Without waiting for the obvious answer, I pass to the firft clafs of arguments, on which the truth of this mortifying doctrine is established.

A

SECOND PAR T.

con

S no man is bound to believe what is co trary to common fenfe; if the above flated doctrine appears irrational, Scriptures, Articles, Homilies, and Liturgy, are quoted in vain when men of parts are preffed with their C authority,