III. SERM. them, as if we could place them at fome greater diftance by excluding them from our thoughts. This indeed is the refuge of too many; but it is the refuge of fools, who aggravate thereby the terrors they muft encounter. For he that cometh, fhall come, and will not tarry. To his coming, let us look with a steady eye; and as life advances through its progreffive ftages, prepare for its close, and for appearing before him who made us. THUS I have endeavoured to point out the reflections proper to be made, when the question is put to any of us, How old art thou? I have shown with what eye we should review the past years of our life; in what light we should confider the prefent; and with what dispositions look forward to the future: In order that fuch a question may always leave fome ferious impreffion behind it; and may dispose us fo to number the years of our life, that we may apply our hearts unto wisdom. SERMON IV. On the DUTIES belonging to MIDDLE AGE. I CORINTHIANS, xiii. II. -When I became a man, I put away IV. To every thing, fays the wife man, there SERM. is a feafon; and a time to every purpose under heaven *. As there are duties which belong to particular fituations of fortune, fo there are duties alfo which refult from particular periods of human life. In every period of it, indeed, that comprehensive rule takes place, Fear God, and keep his com VOL. III. * Ecclef. iii. 1. F mandments; IV. SERM. mandments; for this is the whole duty of man*. Piety to God, and charity to men, are incumbent upon perfons of every age, as foon as they can think and act. Yet these virtues, in different ftages of life, affume different forms; and when they appear in that form which is moft fuited to our age, they appear with peculiar gracefulness; they give propriety to conduct, and add dignity to character. In former discourses I have treated of the virtues which adorn youth, and of the duties which specially belong to old age t. The circle of those duties which refpect middle age is indeed much larger. As that is the bufy period in the life of man, it includes in effect the whole compass of religion, and therefore cannot have its peculiar character fo definitely marked and afcertained. At the fame time, during those years wherein one is fenfible that he has advanced beyond the confines of youth, but has not yet paffed into the region of old age, there are * Ecclef. xii. 13. + See vol. I, Sermons 11 and 12. feveral por feveral things which reflection on that I. I BEGIN with observing, that the first duty of those who are become men is, as the text expreffes it, to put away childish things. The feason of youthful levities, follies, and paffions, is now over. These have had their reign; a reign perhaps too long; and to which a termination is certainly proper at laft. Much indulgence is due to youth. Many things admit of excufe then, which afterwards become unpardon F 2 SERM. IV. IV. SERM. pardonable. Some things may even be graceful in youth, which, if not criminal, are at least ridiculous, in perfons of maturer years. It is a great trial of wisdom, to make our retreat from youth with propriety; to affume the character of manhood, without expofing ourselves to reproach, by an unfeasonable remainder of juvenility, on the one hand, or by precife and disgusting formality, on the other, Nature has placed certain boundaries, by which she difcriminates the pleasures, actions, and employments, that are fuited to the different ftages of human life. It becomes us, neither to overleap those boundaries by a transition too hafty and violent ; nor to hover too long on one fide of the limit, when nature calls us to pass over to the other. There are particularly two things in which middle age fhould preferve its diftinction and feparation from youth; these are, levities of behaviour, and intemperate indulgence of pleasure. The gay spirits of the young often prompt an inconfiderate 6 degree |