Secondly. Consider these things impartially. All wicked men are of a party against Religion. Some lust or interest engageth them against it. Hence it comes to pass that they are apt to slight the strongest arguments that can be brought for it, and to cry up very weak ones against it. Men do generally and without difficulty assent to mathematical truths, because it is nobody's interest to deny them; but men are slow to believe moral and divine truths, because by their lusts and interest they are prejudiced against them. And therefore you may observe that the more virtuously any man lives, and the less he is inslaved to any lust, the more ready he is to entertain the principles of Religion.

Therefore when you are examining these matters, do not take into consideration any sensual or worldly interest, but deal clearly and impartially with yourselves. Let not temporal and little ad

vantages sway you against a greater and more durable interest. Think thus with

yourselves, that you have not the making of things true or false, but that the truth and existence of things is already fixed and settled, and that the principles of Religion are already either determinately true or false before you think of them; either there is a God, or there is not; either your souls are immortal, or they are not; one of these is certain and necessary, and is not now to be altered: the truth of things will not comply with our conceits, and bend itself to our interests. Therefore do not think what would have to be, but consider impartially what is, and (if it be) will be whether you will or no. Do not reason thus-I would fain be wicked, and therefore it is my interest that there should be no God, and no life after this; and therefore I will endeavour to prove that there is no such thing, and will shew all

you

the favour I can to that side of the question; I will bend my understanding and wit to strengthen the negative, and will study to make it as true as I can. This is fond, because it is the way to cheat thyself; and that we may do as often as we please, but the nature of things will not be imposed upon. If then thou be as wise as thou oughtest to be, thou wilt reason thus with thyself: -my highest interest is not to be deceived about these matters, therefore setting aside all other considerations, I will endeavour to know the truth, and yield to that.

And now it is time to draw towards a conclusion of this long discourse. And that which I have all this while been endeavouring to convince men of and to persuade them to, is no other but what God himself doth particularly recommend to us as proper for human consideration, "Unto man he said, Behold the

fear of the Lord, that is wisdom, and to depart from evil is understanding." Whoever pretends to reason, and calls himself a man, is obliged to acknowledge God, and to demean himself religiously towards him. For God is to the understanding of man as the light of the Sun is to our eyes, the first and the plainest and the most glorious object of it. He fills heaven and earth, and every thing in them does represent him to us. Which way soever we turn ourselves, we are encountered with clear evidences and sensible demonstrations of a Deity. For (as the Apostle reasons) "the invisible things of Him from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even his eternal power and godhead : εἰς τὸ εἶναι αὐτὲς ἀναπολογήτες, so that they are without excuse;"0 that is, those men that know not God have no apology to make for themselves; or if men do know

and believe that there is such a being as God, not to consider the proper consequences of such a principle, not to demean ourselves towards him as becomes our relation to him and dependence upon him and the duty which we naturally owe him, this is great stupidity and inconsiderateness.

And yet he that considers the lives and actions of the greatest part of men would verily think that they understood nothing of all this. Therefore the Scripture represents wicked men as without understanding. "It is a nation void of counsel, neither is there any understanding in them:"" and elsewhere, "Have all the workers of iniquity no knowledge ?" * Not that they are destitute of the natural faculty of understanding, but they do not use it as they ought; they are not blind, but they wink," they detain the truth of God in unrighteousness, and though they know God, yet they do not glorify him

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