of probation in this world, and of regulating their future reward or punishment according to their use or abuse of such a dispensation.

The delay of the punishment of sinners, you say, is repugnant to the justice of God. Quite the contrary. What do you call justice in God? What! Such an impetuous emotion as that which animates you against those who affront you, and whom you consider as enemies? An implacable madness, which enrageth you to such a degree that a sight of all the miseries into which you are going to involve them is not able to curb? Is this what you call justice?

But I suppress all these reflections, and return to my principle, (and this is not the first time we have been obliged to proportion the length of a discourse, not to the nature of the subject, but to the impatience of our hearers.) I return to my principle; the delay of the punishment of sinners will not seem incompatible with the justice of God, unless you consider that perfection detached from another perfection, by which God in a most eminent manner displays his glory, I mean his mercy. An explication of the last clause of our text, the sinner doth evil an hundred times, and God prolongeth his days, will place the matter in a clear light for the long-suffering of God with sinners flows from his mercy. St. Peter confirms this when he tells us, The Lord is not slack concerning his promise, but is long-suffering to us-ward, not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance, 2 Epist. iii. 9.

It is with the same view that Jesus Christ calls the whole time, during which God delayed the destruction of Jerusalem, the time of the visitation of that miserable city, Luke xix. 44. And for the same reason St. Paul calls the whole time, which God puts between the commission of sin and

the destruction of sinners, riches of forbearance, and long-suffering, that lead to repentance, Rom. ii. 4. And who could flatter himself with the hope of escaping devouring fire, and everlasting burnings, Isa. xxxiii. 14. were God to execute immediately his sentence against evil works, and to make punishment instantly follow the practice of sin ?

. What would have become of David, if divine mercy had not prolonged his days after he had. fallen into the crimes of adultery and murder; or if justice had called him to give an account of his conduct, while his heart, burning with a criminal passion, was wishing only to gratify it; while he was sacrificing the honor of a wife, the life of a husband, along with his own body, which should have been a temple of the Holy Ghost, to the criminal passion that inflamed his soul? It was the long-suffering, the patience of God, that gave him time to recover himself, to get rid of his infatuation, to see the horror of his sin, and to say under a sense of it, Have mercy upon me, O God, according to thy loving kindness: according unto the multitude of thy mercies blot out my transgressions. Wash me thoroughly from mine iniquity, and cleanse me from my sin. For I acknowledge my transgressions; and my sin is ever before me. Against thee, thee only have I sinned, and done this evil in thy sight: that thou mightest be justified when thou speakest, and be clear when thou judgest, Psal. li. 1-4.

What would have become of Manasseh, if God had called him to give an account of his administration while he was making the house of God the theatre of his dissoluteness and idolatry; while he was planting groves, rearing up altars for the host of heaven, making his sons pass through the fire,

doing more wickedly than the Amorites, making Judah to sin with his dung hill-gods, as the holy scripture calls them? 2 Kings xxi. 3, 6, 11. It was the long-suffering of God that bore with him, that engaged him to humble himself, to pray fervently to the God of his fathers, and to become an exemplary convert, after he had been an example of infidelity and impurity.

What would have become of St. Peter, if God had called him to give an account of himself, while, frightened and subverted at the sight of the judges and executioners of his Saviour, he was pronouncing those cowardly words, I know not the man? Matt. xxvi. 74. It was the long-suffering and patience of God that gave him an opportunity of seeing the merciful looks of Jesus Christ immediately after his denial of him, of fleeing from a place fatal to his innocence, of going out to weep bitterly, and of saying to Jesus Christ, Lord, thou knowest that I love thee: Lord, thou knowest all things, thou knowest that I love thee, John xxi. 16, 17.

What would have become of St. Paul, if God had required an account of his administration, while he was breathing out threatenings and slaughter against the disciples of the Lord, Acts ix. 1. while he was ambitious of stifling the new-born church in her cradle, while he was soliciting letters from the high-priest to pervert and to punish the disciples of Christ? It was the long-suffering of God, that gave him an opportunity of saying, Lord, what wilt thou have me to do? ver. 6. It was the patience of God, which gave him an opportunity of making that honest confession, I was before a blasphemer, and a persecutor, and injurious: But I obtained mercy, 1 Tim. i. 13.

IV. But why should we go out of this assembly, (and here we enter into the last article, and shall

endeavor to prevent your abuse of the patience of God in the dispositions of men) why should we go out of this assembly, to search after proofs of divine mercy in a delay of punishment? What would have become of you, my dear hearers, if vengeance had immediately followed sin; if God had not prolonged the days of sinners; if sentence against evil works had been executed speedily?

What would have become of some of you, if God had required of you an account of your conduct, while you were sacrificing the rights of widows and orphans to the honor of the persons of the mighty, Lev. xix. 15. while you were practising perjury and accepting bribes? It is the long-suffering of God that prolongs your days, that you may make a restitution of your unrighteous gain, plead for the orphan and the widow, and attend in future decisions only to the nature of the cause before

you.

What would have become of some of you, if God had called you to give an account of your conduct, while the fear of persecution, or, what is infinitely more criminal still, while the love of ease, prevailed over you to renounce a religion which you respected in your hearts while you denied it with your mouths? It is the patience of God, which hath afforded you time to learn the greatness of a sin, the guilt of which a whole life of repentance is not sufficient to expiate: it is the patience of God, which hath prolonged your days, that you might confess that Jesus whom you have betrayed, and profess that gospel which you have denied.

Let us not multiply particular examples, let us comprise this whole assembly in one class. There is not one of our hearers, no, not one, who is in this church to-day, there is not one who hath been engaged in the devotional exercises of this day,

who would not have been in hell with the devil and his angels, if vengeance had immediately followed sin; if God had exercised no patience toward sinners; if sentence against evil works had been executed speedily. It is of the Lord's mercies that we are not consumed! Lam. iii. 22. The delay of punishment is a demonstration of his mercy; it doth not prove that he is not just, but it doth prove that he is good.

I could wish, my brethren, that all those, who ought to interest themselves in this article, would render it needless for me to enter into particulars, by recollecting the history of their own lives, and by remembering the circumstances to which I refer. One man ought to say to himself; In my childhood, an upright father, a pious mother, and several worthy tutors did all that lay in their power to form me virtuous. In my youth, a tender and generous friend, who was more concerned for my happiness, and more ambitious of my excelling, than I myself, availed himself of all the power of insinuation that nature had given to incline my heart to piety and to the fear of God, and to attach me to religion by bands of love. On a certain occasion, Providence put into my hands a religious book, the reading of which discovered to me the turpitude of my conduct. At another time, one of those clear, affecting, thundering sermons, that alarm sleepy souls, forced from me a promise of repentance and reformation. One day, I saw the administration of the Lord's supper, which, awaking my attention to the grand sacrifice that divine justice required for the sins of mankind, affected me in a manner so powerful and moving, that I thought myself obliged in gratitude to dedicate my whole life to him, who in the tenderest compassion had given himself for me. Another time, an extreme