HERE, then, let us leave" the Spirits and Souls of the Righteous;" cfcaped from an entangling Wildernefs, and received into a Paradife of Delights! escaped from the Territories of Difquietude, and settled in Regions of unmolested Security! Here they fit down with Abraham, Ifaac, and Jacob, in the Kingdom of their Father. Here they mingle with an innumerable. Company of Angels, and rejoice around the Throne of the Lamb; rejoice in the Fruition of prefent Felicity, and in the affured Expectation of an inconceivable Addition to their Blifs; when "GOD fhall "call the Heavens from above, and the "Earth, that he may judge his People.". "Fools accounted their Life Madness, and "their End to be without Honour: But how

are they numbered among the Children of "GOD, and their Lot is among the Saints!" However, then, an undiscerning World may despise, and a profane World vilify, the truly Religious; be this the invariable Defire of my Heart!" Let me live the Life, and die "the Death, of the Righteous. Oh! let my latter End, and future State, be like "theirs!"

WHAT

WHAT Figure is That, which strikes my Eye, from an eminent Part of the Wall? It is not only in a more elevated Situation than the reft, but carries a more fplendid and fumptuous Air than ordinary. Swords and Spears, murthering Engines, and Inftruments of Slaughter, adorn the Stone with a formidable Magnificence.

It proves to be the Monument of a noble Warrior. Is fuch Refpect, thought I, paid to the Memory of this brave Soldier, for facrificeing his Life to the publick Good?—Then what Honours, what immortal Honours, are due to His moft precious Name, who willingly gave Himself a bleeding Propitiation for Sinners! The One died, being a Mortal; and only yielded up a Life, that was long before forfeited to Divine Justice; which must foon have been furrendered as a Debt to Nature, if it had not fallen as a Prey to War: But CHRIST took Flesh, and gave up the Ghoft, though he was the Bleffed and Only Potentate. He, who thought it no. Robbery to be Equal with God; He, whofe Outgoings were from everlasting; even He, was made in the Likeness of Man,

and

and cut off out of the Land of the Living. Wonder, O Heavens! Be astonished, O Earth! He died the Death, of whom it is witneffed, that He is "true GOD, and eter"nal Life."

THE one expofed Himself to Peril, in the Service of his King and Country; which, though it was glorious to do, yet would have been ignominious, in fuch Circumftances, to have declined. But CHRIST took the Field, though he was fure to drop in the Engagement. CHRIST put on the Harness, though He knew before-hand, it must reek with his Blood. CHRIST refigned Himself not to the Hazard, but to the inevitable Stroke; to certain Death.

And for whom? Not for those who were in any Degree deferving; but for his own disobedient Creatures; for the Pardon of condemned Malefactors; for a Band of Rebels, a Race of Traitors, the most obnoxious and inexcufable of all Criminals, whom He might have left to perish in their Iniquities, without the leaft Impeachment of his Goodness; nay, to the advantageous Display of his avenging Justice.

THE One, 'tis probable, died expeditiously; was foon wounded, and foon flain: A Bullet lodged in his Heart, a Sword fheathed in his Breast, or a Battle-ax cleaving the Brain, might put a speedy End to his Mifery; difpatch him " as in a Moment :" Whereas, the Divine Redeemer expired in tedious and protracted Torments. His Pangs were as lingering, as they were exquifite. Even in the Prelude to his laft Sufferings, what a Load of Sorrows overwhelmed his facred Humanity! till the intolerable Preffure wrung Blood, instead of Sweat, from every Pore; till the crimson Flood bathed his Body, ftained all his Raiment, and tinged the very Stones. But when the laft Scene of the Tragedy commenced; when the Executioner's Hammer had nailed him to the Cross; Oh! how many difmal Hours did that illuftrious Sufferer hang! tentered all the while on the keeneft Edge of mortal Pain. So long he hung, that Nature, through all her Dominions, was thrown into fympathizing Commotions. The Earth cou'd no longer fuftain fuch .barbarous Indignities, without trembling; nor the Sun behold them, with

Out

out Horror. Nay, fo long did he hang in this Extremity of Torture, that the Alarm reached even the remote Regions of the Dead. Never, O my Soul, never forget the amazing Truth: The Lamb of GoD was worried, was flaughtered with the ut moft Inhumanity, and endured Death in all its Bitterness for thee. His Murtherers, ftudiously cruel, fo guided the fatal Cup, that he tafted every Drop of its Gall, before he drank it off to the very Dregs.

ONCE again; The One died like a Hero, and fell gallantly in the Field of Battle. But died not CHRIST " as a Fool dieth?" Not on the Bed of Honour, with Scars of Glory in his Breaft; but, like fome execrable Mifcreant, on a Gibbet; with Lashes of the vile Scourge on his Back. Yes, the bleffed JESUs bowed his expiring Head on the accursed Tree, and poured out his Soul betwixt two infamous Felons; fufpended between Heaven and Earth, as an Outcast from Both, and unworthy of Either.

OH! what fuitable Returns of inflamed and adoring Devotion can we make to the Holy One of GOD, thus dying, that we might live? Dying in Ignominy and Anguifh,

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