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sin if we do not: for it is the command of God in my text, In the day of prosperity be joyful. But yet prosperity is then only a real blessing, when we are truly thankful to God for it; when we take a moderate delight and satisfaction in it; when we soberly make use of the good things God hath given us for ourselves, and out of our plenty supply the poverty of others, according to our proportion and ability; when we walk humbly with our God and with our neighbour, and honour the Lord with our substance; and, in a word, when we make use of our temporal prosperity, as a help and furtherance to our eternal happiness.

I conclude all with the excellent collect and prayer of our church on the fourth Sunday after Trinity.

"O God, the Protector of all that trust in thee, "without whom nothing is strong, nothing is holy; "increase and multiply upon us thy mercy that, "thou being our Ruler and Guide, WE MAY SO 66 PASS THROUGH THINGS TEMPORAL, THAT WE "FINALLY LOSE NOT THE THINGS ETERNAL. "Grant this, O heavenly Father, for Jesus Christ's "sake, our Lord and Saviour."

To whom, with thee and the Holy Ghost, be ascribed, as is most due, all honour and glory, might, majesty, and dominion, both now and for evermore. Amen.

SERMON XVII.

ADVERSITY THE PROPER SEASON OF SERIOUS CONSIDERATION; AND SO CONTRIVED BY THE PROVIDENCE of god, THAT IT SHOULD BE INTERMIXED WITH PROSPERITY; AND THIS MIXTURE OF GOOD AND EVIL SO PROPORTIONED BY THE SAME PROVIDENCE, THAT IT OBVIATES ALL DISCONTENT AND MURMURING AGAINST GOD.

ECCLES. vii. 14.

In the day of prosperity be joyful, but in the day of adversity consider: God also hath set the one over against the other, to the end that man should find nothing after him. IN my entrance on this text, having shewn the connection of it with the preceding verses, and fully explained it, I raised these plain and useful propositions and observations from it.

I. The good and prosperous days and times of our life are in God's design given to us, as peculiar times of comfort and rejoicing.

II. The evil days, the days and times of our affliction and trouble, are in God's design the proper seasons of recollection and serious consideration.

III. The providence of God hath so contrived it, that our good and evil days, our days of prosperity and adversity, should be intermingled each with the other.

IV. This mixture of good and evil days is by the divine Providence so proportioned, that it sufficiently justifies the dealings of God towards the sons

Adversity the proper Season, &c.

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of men, and obviates all our discontents and murmurings against him.

I have already despatched the first of these observations, and therein endeavoured fully to instruct you in the right use of a prosperous state. I proceed now to the second observation.

II. The evil days, the days and times of our affliction and trouble, are in God's design the proper seasons of recollection and serious consideration.

But in the day of adversity consider. And indeed if then we do not consider, we shall never consider; if sadness will not make us serious, nothing will. But what are we to consider in the day of adversity?

1. We are to consider from whom the adversity or affliction comes. And here we are to look above all secondary causes and instruments to God, who is above all, by whose either efficacious operation, or wise and just permission, every evil of affliction, that befalls us, happens to us. This is the plain doctrine of God himself, by his prophet Amos, chap. iii. 6. Shall there be evil in the city, and the Lord hath not done it? No, certainly. God is the great Disposer of all the evils of affliction that happen to us. This consideration will be of mighty force to make us submit to the present adversity or affliction under which we labour. It is God's doing, (by whatever means or instruments it comes to pass,) and therefore we must submit. This was the argument which induced holy Job to a patient submission, Job i. 21. The Lord gave, and the Lord hath taken away; blessed be the name of the Lord. He looked not to the secondary causes that had robbed him of his wealth, and his children too, for whom his

wealth was provided, but to God the supreme Governor and Disposer of all things. It is true, sometimes we bring affliction and trouble on ourselves, through our own sin and folly. But even in this case, there is a hand of God, for some former sin or sins, justly permitting us to fall into such sin and folly. Wherefore in such cases we are indeed to blame ourselves; but we are also to acknowledge the righteous judgment of God, and seriously to inquire after that sin which provoked God to leave us, and suffer us to fall into that folly.

2. We are to consider for what God sends the adversity or affliction on us. And here generally it is true, that it is sent for some sin or sins of ours that have deserved it. Generally, I say, but not always. For Job's afflictions were sent on him from God, by way of trial of his virtues. Yet even in this case, there was some antecedent or foregoing sin that might deserve those afflictions, though there had been no occasion of trial. And therefore Job himself, though he would never acknowledge any insincerity or hypocrisy, or greater crime, for which those evils befell him; yet he often acknowledgeth himself to be a sinner, that had deserved as much as he suffered, with respect to the strict justice and righteousness of God. But generally, I say, it is true, that our afflictions come upon us for our sins, and therefore we ought to bear them patiently, according to that of the prophet, I will bear the indignation of the Lord, because I have sinned against him, Micah vii. 9.

3. We are to consider with what end and design God sends adversity and affliction on us. It is with a design of love and kindness, unless we be such as

have continually hardened our hearts against former afflictions, and thereby rendered ourselves incorrigible. Excepting this case, all afflictions that befall us are designed in love and kindness to us, to bring us to repentance, or to further our repentance, and make us better by a greater hatred of sin, and by a more zealous prosecution of virtue and goodness.

This doctrine is plainly taught us by a prophet of the Lord, Lament. iii. 32, 33. But though he cause grief, yet will he have compassion according to the multitude of his mercies; for he doth not afflict willingly nor grieve the children of men as if he had said, God doth not afflict men for affliction's sake, as if he took delight in their sorrows, but out of kindness and love to do them good, to make them good when nothing else will. So the author of the Epistle to the Hebrews, chap. xii. from verse 5 to 12 inclusively: And ye have forgotten the exhortation which speaketh unto you as unto children, My son, despise not thou the chastening of the Lord, nor faint when thou art rebuked of him: for whom the Lord loveth he chasteneth, and scourgeth every son whom he receiveth. If ye endure chastening, God dealeth with you as with sons; for what son is he whom the father chasteneth not? But if ye be without chastisement, whereof all are partakers, then are ye bastards, and not sons. Furthermore we have had fathers of our flesh which corrected us, and we gave them reverence: shall we not much rather be in subjection to the Father of spirits, and live? For they verily for a few days chastened us after their own pleasure; but he for our profit, that we might be partakers of his holiness. Now no chastening

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