fo mad on their Lufts, that they break thro the Restraints of Reafon and Religion, and all the Remonftrances of Confcience, when they know not but they may die in the midst of their Follies; what wou'd thefe Wretches be, what wou'd they do, yea, what wou'd they not do, to gratify and please their fenfual Appetites, could they be afcertain'd of half an Age to come? Indeed, fuch is the amazing Degeneracy of Human Nature, that Men who are enflav'd to their Lufts, do not only take encouragement to fin from the vain Expectation of a long Life, but are fometimes excited with the utmost Violence to purfue their forbidden Pleafures, when they apprehend that their time here will be very fhort. Therefore when we tell the Men of Liberty and Pleafure, who have made great Advances in Sin, that they must shortly bid an Eternal Adieu to every thing that flatters and courts their Senfes; they do like the obstinate Jews, who when God had told 'em by his Prophet, that they should shortly be cut off by his Judgments, faid, Let us eat and drink, for to morrow we shall die. And I remember, the Book of Wisdom reprefents the Wicked as encouraging themselves to be diffolute and luxurious, from the Confideration of the Shortnefs and Vanity of Human Life, in fuch words as thefe: Our Life Shall pafs wifd. 2.4.9 away as the Trace of a Cloud, and shall be dif pers'd as a Mist that is driven away with the Beams of the Sun, and overcome with the Heat thereof. For our time is a very Shadow that paffeth away. Come on therefore, let us enjoy the good things that are prefent; and let us Speedily use the Creatures, like as in Youth. Let us

fill our felves with coftly Wine, and Ointments; and let no Flower of the Spring pass by us.

Let

us crown our selves with Rofe-buds before they be wither'd. Let none of us go without his part of our Follity: Let us leave Tokens of our Foyfulness in every place; for this is our Portion, and our Lot is this. Can any thing be more abfurd than fuch Inferences as thefe, from the Confideration of the Shortnefs of Life, and the Certainty of Death? Yet these are the celebrated Maxims of those who place Happiness in the Gratifications of the Animal Nature, and know no Pleasures beyond thofe of the Body. 'Tis a remarkable Passage which is recited by Herodotus concerning Mycerinus, one of the Kings of Egypt, That when Notice was given him by an Oracle, that he had no more than fix Years to live; finding that neither the Apologies he made for himself, nor the Complaints he return'd to the Oracle, could alter the Decrees of Fate, he refolv'd to indulge himself in Eafe and Luxury, to live faft; and by turning the Nights into fo many Days, he contriv'd to live twelve Years in fix.

Again, Did we certainly know that upon fuch a Day the best and dearest Friend we had upon Earth would take his final leave of us, how should we anticipate the forrows of parting, and live under continual Fear and Dread? Finally, The Living know that they shall die, but the particular Time, and the various Circumstances thereof, are in much Goodness and Wisdom conceal'd from us, that fo we may be always ready.

Vid. Herodot. lib. 2. Hift.

Indeed

Indeed the Holy Scripture informs us, that Enoch and Elijah had the Privilege to be exempted from the great Law of dying. Of the Gen. 5. 24 former 'tis faid, That he walk'd with God and

2

II.

was not, for God took him: and of the latter, Kings 2. That he went up by a Whirlwind into Heaven. So that their Time run into Eternity, with very little interruption; fome there feems to have been, for without doubt they paft under a very confiderable Change, before they were admitted to the Pleafures of the Heavenly State: For Flesh and Blood, as 'tis now fram'd, fashion'd, and corrupted, cannot inherit the Kingdom of God.

1 Cor. 15.

51.

17.

Moreover, the fame Apoftle fays, That tho we shall not all fleep, i. e. die, yet we shall be chang'd. He fpeaks of thofe that fhall be alive when our Saviour fhall come to judg the World: Thefe Men fhall not die like others, but shall pass under a Change that shall be equiValent to Death, as the Scriptures in the Margin fhew. The Apoftle, after he had spoken 1 Theff. 4 of our Saviour's defcending from Heaven with a Shout, with the Voice of the Archangel, and the Trump of God, he adds, That the Dead in Chrift fhall rife first then we which are alive and remain, fhall be caught up together with them in the Clouds, to meet the Lord in the Air; and fo fhall we ever be with the Lord. But this fhall not be till these Perfons have pafs'd under a Change, as appears from the above cited Text. So that the Living know that all fhall die, except thofe that fhall be alive when Chrift comes to judg the Quick and the Dead.

I proceed now to the fecond general Head of Difcourfe:

II. And that is to fhew you, That Man's be ing under a neceffity of Dying, is no Reflection either on the Wisdom or the Goodness of God. And this will appear from the following Confiderations.

1. Man being compos'd of Soul and Body, was originally liable to Diffolution, or capable of dying, as I hinted before. Indeed if Man had never fin'd, he would certainly never have died. But being fix'd in fuch Circumftances, that 'twas poffible for him to fin, 'twas alfo poffible for him to die. So that with this Explication and Restriction we may affirm, That Man was not immortal by Nature, but was originally capable of dying. Tho I affert, that if Man had continu'd innocent, he should never have tasted Death; and I am inclin'd to think, that human Life even then would have been continu'd after an extraordinary manner. Agreeable to this, is the Opinion of a late modern Divine, who Speaking of Man whilft innocent, fays, He was immortal, not from everlasting Principles of Nature, but by Divine Prefervation; of which the Tree of Life was the Ordain'd Means and Sacramental Pledge. And if fo, 'twas purely in the Pleasure of Almighty God, who is the Author of our Beings, and the Supreme Arbiter of Life and Death, to continue the one, or difcontinue the other, according to his Sovereign Pleasure. If God Almighty was under no Obligation to give us Being, he can be under none to continue the Beings that he voluntarily made out of nothing, any longer than he pleafes. All human Creatures

Dr. Bates's Works, p. 419.

are as much indebted to Heaven for their Confervation, as they are for their Existence. Now if the matter be as I have stated it; if our Bodies were not originally immortal, but capable in their own Nature of Diffolution; to be fure it cannot be inconfiftent with the Justice or Goodness of God, either to fufpend, or to bestow an Immortality, which is a fupernatural Privilege, upon what Terms he pleafes. 'Tis allow'd by all, befide the Obligations which Adam was under to keep the Moral Law, from his natural Relation to God as a Creator, that God restrain'd him by a pofitive Law from eating of the Tree of Knowledg of Good and Evil; and at the fame time gave him the higheft Affurance in the World, that his Abftinence fhould be rewarded with Immortality. Now for the Accomplishment of this, and that the Decays of Nature might be prevented, or at leaft repair'd, that a Man made of Duft might not be reduc'd to Duft again; 'tis the Opinion of many Divines, that the Tree of Life, planted in the midst of Paradife, had a Virtue in it that would render human Bodies (naturally capable of Death) durable and immortal. But Adam having actually violated the Divine Law, by eating of the forbidden Fruit, God cuts him off from the Privilege which he might have enjoy'd by the Tree of Life; and left him not only to the ordinary Courfe of Nature, but pronounc'd upon him the Sentence of Death. And I prefume all Men will allow, that upon Adam's Difobedience and Apoftacy, 'twas no Impeachment of the Divine Justice to chafe him out of Paradife, and to deprive him wholly of the ufe of the Tree of Life. Now if Adam was not