that although punishment does not always overtake the wicked in this life, yet it falls upon them more frequently and heavily than we are aware of. They are often punished when we do not observe it; but they are also sometimes punished in the most public and conspicu

ous manner.

The very first offence committed by man after the creation of the world was, as we know to our cost, followed by immediate and exemplary punishment. The next great criminal, Cain, was rendered a fugitive and a vagabond upon earth, and held up as an object of execration and abhorrence to mankind. When the whole earth was sunk in wickedness, it was overwhelmed by a deluge. The abominations of Sodom and Gomorrah were avenged by fire from heaven. The tyrant Pharaoh and his host were drowned in the Red Sea. Korah, Dathan, and Abiram, and their rebellious companions, were buried alive in the bowels of the earth. It was for their portentous wickedness and savage practices that the Canaanite nations were exterminated by the Israelites; and it was for their idolatries, their licentiousness, and their rebellions against God, that the Israelites themselves were repeatedly driven into exile, reduced to slavery, and at length their city, their temple, and their whole civil polity utterly destroyed, and themselves scattered and dispersed over every part of the known world, and every where treated with derision and contempt. It will be said, perhaps, that these were the consequences of the peculiar theocratic form of their government, under which the rewards and the punishments were temporal and immediate, and that they are not to be expected in the present state of human affairs. Still however they are proofs, and tremendous proofs, that God is not an inattentive and unconcerned spectator of human wickedness. But let us come to our own times, and to the fates and fortunes of individuals under our own observation. Do we not continually see that they who indulge their passions without control, and give an unbounded loose to every corrupt propensity of their hearts, are sooner or later

the victims of their own intemperance and licentiousness? Do they not madly sacrifice to the love of pleasure, and frequently within a very short space of time, their health, their fortune, their characters, their peace of mind, and that too completely and effectually, and beyond all hopes of recovery? The instances of this are many and dreadful, without taking into the account such flagrant crimes as deliver men over into the hands of public justice. Now what is all this but the sentence of God speedily executed against evil works? It may be alledged, that these are only the natural conse. quences of wrong conduct, and not the immediate judi, cial inflictions of Heaven. But who is it that has made these evils the natural consequences of vice? Who but the great Author of nature? He hath purposely formed his world and his creature man in such a manner, that these penalties shall follow close upon wickedness, as a present mark of his abhorrence and detestation of it; and they fall on many offenders, both so speedily and so heavily, that till second thoughts correct the first im pression, it seems almost an impeachment of his goodness that he inflicts them.

Still it must be confessed that wickedness is sometimes triumphant; and so also does folly sometimes meet with success in the world; but it is true notwithstanding, that it labours under great disadvantages, and immoral conduct under still greater, The natural ten, dency of sin is to misery. Accidents may now and then prevent this, but not generally; art and cunning may evade it, but not nearly so often as men imagine.

But supposing the guilty to escape for a time all suf, ferings, and in consequence of it, to please themselves highly with the prudence of their choice; yet still pun ishment, though slow, may overtake them at last.The blindness of such men to consequences is quite astonishing. One man evades the penalties of human laws in a few instances, and therefore concludes he shall never be overtaken by them. Another preserves his reputation for a time, and thence imagines it to be perfectly secure. A third finds his health hold

out a few years, and therefore has not the least suspicion that what he is always undermining must fall at

last.

Now each of these may, if he pleases, applaud his own wisdom; but every one else must see his extreme stupidity and folly. In fact, whoever commits sin has swallowed poison, which from that moment begins to operate; at first perhaps by a pleasing intoxication, afterward by slow and uncertain degrees, but still the disease is within, and is mortal; and since it may every instant break out with fatal violence, it is a melancholy thing to see the person infected filled with a mad joy, which must end in heaviness and death.

Vice especially of some sorts, affects to wear a smil. ing countenance, and the days that are spent in it pass along for a time pleasantly enough; but little do the poor wretches that are deluded by it reflect what bitterness they are treasuring up for the rest of life, and how soon they may come to taste it in such consequences, as even the completest reformation, and the strictest care afterwards, will very imperfectly either prevent or

cure.

After all, however, it must be acknowledged, that there are numbers of worthless and profligate men, who go on for a considerable length of time, perhaps even to the end of their days, in a full tide of worldly prosperity, blessed with every thing that is thought most valuable in this life, wealth, power, rank, health and strength, and enjoying all these advantages without interruption and alloy, coming in no misfortune like other folk, and not plagued or afflicted like other

men."

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These, it must be confessed, are strong symptoms of happiness, if we are to judge from appearance only. But does not every one know that happiness depends infinitely less upon external circumstances than on the internal comfort, content, and satisfaction of the mind? May I not appeal to every one here present, whether some of the acutest sufferings, and the most exquisite joys he has experienced, are not those which are confin

!

ed to his own breast, which he enjoys in secrecy and in silence, in his retired and private moments, unobserved by the world, and independent on all exterior show? "The heart only (says the wise man most truly) knoweth its own bitterness, and a stranger doth not intermeddle with its joy." This then is the standard by which you must measure human happiness. You must not too hastily conclude that prosperity is felicity. In order to know whether these men are truly what they seem to be, you must follow them into their retirements, into their closets, and to their couches; and if you could then see the interior of their hearts, you would probably find them objects rather of pity than of envy. Whatever they may pretend, or whatever air of cheerfulness they may assume, it is utterly impossible that they, whose sole object is to gratify their passions without the least regard to the feelings of others; who are corrupting all around them by their conversation and their example, or spreading ruin, misery, and desolation over the world by their inordinate ambition; who not only live in a constant violation of the commands of their maker, but perhaps even deny his existence, renounce his authority, and treat every thing serious and religious with derision and contempt: it is, I say, utterly impossible that these men, whatever external magnificence or gaiety may surround them, can enjoy that peace and comfort and content of mind, which alone constitutes real and substantial happiness, and without which every thing else is insipid and unsatisfactory. A secret consciousness that they are acting wrong, that they are degrading and debasing their na ture, and wasting their time in mean, unworthy, and mischievous pursuits; frequent pangs of remorse for the irreparable injuries they have done to those whom they have betrayed or oppressed, and whose peace and comfort they have forever destroyed; a dread of that Almighty Being whom they have resisted and insulted; a fear of death, and an apprehension of that punishment hereafter, which, though they affect to disbelieve and

* Prov. xiv. 10.

despise, they cannot help knowing to be possible, and feeling that they deserve; all these reflections, which, in spite of their utmost efforts to stifle them, will very often force themselves upon their minds, are sufficient to counteract every other advantage they possess, and to embitter every enjoyment of their lives. All shall look outwardly gay and happy, and all within shall be joyless and gloomy. They shall seem to have every thing they wish, and in fact, have nothing that affords them any genuine satisfaction, or preserves them from the internal wretchedness that perpetually haunts them. "God (as the Psalmist expresses it) gives them their hearts desire, and sends leanness withal into their souls,;"* that is, a total incapacity of deriving any true comfort from the blessings they possess.

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I am not here drawing imaginary pictures of misery, or describing situations which have never existed; I could refer you to well-known examples, which could amply confirm the truth of my assertions, and would elearly show that the prosperity of the wicked is no proof of their happiness; that external calamities and corporeal pains, acute sufferings, disease, or death, are not the only instruments of vengeance which the Almighty has in his hand for the correction of sinners; but that he has other engines of punishment far more terrible than these; that he can plant daggers in the breast of the most triumphant libertine; and that even when their worldly blessings are exalted, his secret dart can pierce their souls, and wring them with tortures sharper than a two-edged sword, yet invisible to every mortal eye .t

It appears, therefore, that sinners are in fact much oftener and much more severely punished than we are aware; that God is even now exercising a moral government over the world; that he is filling them with the fruits of their own devices, and chastening them in

* Psalm cvi. 15.

"As malefactors, when they go to punishment carry their own cross, so wickedness generally carries its own torment along with it, and is a most skilful artificer of its own misery, filling the mind with terror, remorse, and he most agonizing reflections. Plut. Ed. Xyland. v. 2. p. 554. A.

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